SENIOR EXHIBITION

My body of work explores the varying notions of femininity as a response to feminist artists who criticize the representation of women in tradition, culture, and media. Each piece is a fragment of what we view as femininity: vulnerability, strength, restraint, objectification, beauty. I wanted to refrain from making any critical comment unlike the dogmatic labelling of the feminine ideal as a product of social pressures by many contemporary feminist artists, but to simply reflect the way women are represented. By creating versatile artwork that reference a spectrum of what defines femininity, I wanted to show how each interpretation at its core is ultimately driven by a pursuit of beauty.

Much of my work is concerned with reinterpreting the familiar representations of women and femininity. I began by exploring the way women are portrayed in media, creating pieces using materials that are the very sources of these representations: vinyl records and magazine pages. Each piece that explores women’s portrayal in media conveys a distinct idea about an aspect of society, a mimesis of the overt critique of media and society seen in feminist art. I have also drawn from medical imagery to create a sense of sterility and cleanliness to the works, which add another dimension to the way the works and their messages may be perceived.

The idea of woman as a vessel is another metaphor that is prevalent in several of my works. I found that merging this misogynist concept, one that is often criticized by contemporary feminist artists such as Elizabeth Jaeger, with traditional East Asian art styles and media resulted in a compelling juxtaposition between this vulgar comparison and the delicate beauty of craftsmanship in East Asian art forms. This idea is communicated through the titles of the four works that contain references to this theme, with each piece named after the traditional Chinese art form referenced within. Yet that is not to say that the meanings are bound by the subject matter of the pieces. In these pieces, I wanted the viewers to search for meanings themselves, a contrast to the overt, prescribed meanings seen in several of my other pieces that tackle media representations of women. I have strived to achieve aesthetic beauty in all my works to provide the viewers with the opportunity to make their own judgement given the notion of beauty communicated through the aesthetic qualities and the conceptual grounding that explores the idea of femininity within each work.