Reading through Emma Watson’s UN speech on gender equality, i am glad to see that she has not only focused on the problems females experience with being sexualised, but also the problems males face with sensitivity and the pressure of being a ‘man’.
I not only want to show the issues around how females are represented in the media, but I also want to show the issues around men being unable to express their feelings.
Using the following quotes as inspiration, I am planning on painting large scale portraits of men and women, embroidering captions over the relevant painting ;
“Gender equality is your issue too.”
“When at 15 my girlfriends started dropping out of their sports teams because they didn’t want to appear “muscly.””
“When at 18 my male friends were unable to express their feelings.”
“I’ve seen young men suffering from mental illness unable to ask for help for fear it would make them look less “macho””
“I’ve seen men made fragile and insecure by a distorted sense of what constitutes male success”
“We don’t often talk about men being imprisoned by gender stereotypes but I can see that that they are and that when they are free, things will change for women as a natural consequence.”
There are so many more quotes that I could look at too, but I feel these ones really hit home and ensure that it is understood that gender equality is a problem for both sexes.
Reference : http://www.unwomen.org/en/news/stories/2014/9/emma-watson-gender-equality-is-your-issue-too
Here are some secondary source drawings I made using my primary source sketches from the Glyptoteket Gallery in Copenhagen. I really like the use of different colours to represent tones, and the pattern i’ve created with the pen strokes. I like the diagonal lines, and I think the pattern would add a really interesting texture to a painting if it were to be embroidered over the top or underneath the paint.
Took a short trip to Copenhagen to visit a few of the galleries it had to offer – I was not disappointed! The Glyptoteket was by far my favourite, I think I spent about 3 hours in there altogether. In that time I managed to get a few drawings done of the many statues in there, which sparked off further ideas for my project.
The trip was very successful, it has given me inspiration and has introduced me to an artist I had not heard of – Auguste Rodin.
There was a special exhibit on at the SMK National Gallery Of Denmark, showing plenty of his drawings (despite him being known primarily for his sculptures). These drawings were of couples or of women in provocative poses – very fitting for my project.
The texture within his drawings/paintings reminded me of the texture found in silk materials, with watercolours used on them.
Here is an example of his work, depicting a woman in her underwear.
Finally, I got to see my biggest inspiration in exhibition! Andrew Salgado is the reason I started painting portraits, and seeing this selection of work has definitely inspired me further. His use of colour, shapes and textures creates multiple layers to his work, and with the use of colour, he is able to influence the emotion of the painting.
I have been thinking about different ways I could use this in my work. I’m already sewing into canvases, much like he does ; attaching different canvas parts and materials together. But I want to add shapes and brighter colours over the portraits.
Something to think about for when I start my next series of portraits !
As mentioned earlier in my blog, I wanted to research why the floral pattern seems to be associated with females rather than males. I found an article on the subject, written by Andrea Frownfelter.
She writes in ‘Flower Symbolism as Female Sexual Metaphor’, how the flower can be a symbol representing the vagina. This symbolism has been used so often in art, by artists such as Georgia O’Keeffe, and the author of the article.
Andrea uses roses to symbolise vaginas in her work, and has written about what each watercolour painting of hers means. You can read about them here : http://commons.emich.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1210&context=honors
With this idea, I can understand why so many feminist artists use the floral pattern in their artwork. I am now considering on whether I should embroider suggestive flowers into my artwork; roses with lots of petals, or orchids seem to be a popular one in artworks like this. I think these would be difficult to embroider, plus time is an important factor now. Painting is my priority at the moment, but if there is a considerable amount of time left after painting, i’ll start my embroidery work.
References : https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2016/mar/01/georgia-okeeffe-show-at-tate-modern-to-challenge-outdated-views-of-artist
http://commons.emich.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1210&context=honors
