Several years ago I applied to attend a symposium on WOMEN and WORK at MIT. There would be 8 participants from different disciplines and I was the psychologist in the group. Three professors from MIT would be facilitating the week for the group. There was a great deal interesting about that week, but this is how it began:
Red lipstick.
There were two American women professors. One in political science and one in psychology with an emphasis in women’s studies. The third taught French studies and was originally from France. The two American women wore no makeup, unremarkable clothes and Birkenstocks. The other wore deep red lipstick, exquisitely stylish clothes and shoes with a high heel. The week began by discussing cultural differences in appearance and being taken seriously as a scholar or woman in business.
Fast forward to this video from Art21 of Marina Abramovic, in which the film begins with her repetition that “art must be beautiful, art must be beautiful”, all the while pulling at her hair, ever more harshly. Not far beneath the surface is the suggestion that the woman artist, maker or creator should not be beautiful, and not noticed apart from the work. It is the “body of work”, not their body. Their body, must be made invisible, and perhaps even disdained.
In this five minute segment we see some of Abramovic’s remarkable, courageous work through the years and now how disclosing she is about what it has meant to feel free enough to abandon these false choices.
Lee Materazzi, in the featured photograph, takes the fashion “scrunchie” and stacks them as bindings that scrunch the female body, until the body is invisible. Both artists framing the questions of beauty, choice, and the body.
Be well,
Marlene
Photograph by Lee Materazzi @quintgallery; quintgallery.com