STATEMENT
My
artistic practice encompasses photography, video, installation and performance.
I use photographs of objects and people to question issues of artificiality and
idealisation.
I
intend to make it difficult to distinguish the cut-out photograph from the
surrounding scene. In the first instance of looking I hope to create a state of
familiar acceptance of what the viewer is seeing, followed by an uncanny moment when the oddity of the image is
registered, and finally a state where the implied reading collapses, the
cut-out becomes visible to the viewer and the image is read in new terms.
My
artwork forms an enquiry into the act of looking and being looked at. Referring
to psychoanalysis, phenomenology and feminism I examine my own experience of
becoming an object of sight and also consider the experience the viewer has
when looking at me as a female, and a photographic object. Voyeurism and
exhibitionism intertwine as I attempt to disrupt relationships of power in
purposefully provocative scenes.
The Substitute Series 2007-8
Primarily
my artwork is self-portraiture, but not in the traditional sense. In the work I
create a photographic copy of myself and place it in the real world instead of
me. She becomes a substitute and my visual representative. By producing artwork
that establishes me as an object it could be argued that I produce images that
reinforce stereotypical images of the female body, but by depicting my body as
an object I am able to suggest my presence while confirming my absence. With
apparent exhibitionism I create a substitute that renders my real body
invisible. There is a suspension of disbelief taking place in the viewing
public, as they want to see image and body simultaneously. The overtly sexual
nature of the body compels the viewer into the position of voyeur, only to
reveal itself as an inanimate object. This wilful delusion is inherent to the
medium of photography – the desire to look at a 2-dimensional photograph and
believe in the integrity of the 3-dimensional objects that are suggested by the
surface.
Interloper Series 2008-9
My
work is increasingly concerned with the experience of the viewer and I attempt
to define a direct relationship between the cut-out and the person looking at
it. Using digital video or photography I create the illusion of a domestic
scene in which my cut-out becomes a substitute for me. Rather than depicting an
encounter between a man and a cut-out woman, I have attempted to create a
direct relationship between the cut-out and the spectator. The overtly sexual
nature of the body compels the viewer into the position of voyeur, only to
reveal itself as an inanimate object. I aim to prolong the suspension of
disbelief so the disjuncture between the presence and absence of the body is
more pronounced. By creating photographs that are ambiguous I hope to further
explore the relationship the photographic image has to the animate object. By
making cut-outs that appear lifeless I attempt to integrate them seamlessly
into the real world that surrounds them and play on the notion of the animated
photographic subject.
Visual Pleasure 2009-10
In
this series I examine the artificiality of femininity, and the strategies we
employ to create the illusion of sexuality.
In the photographs the female character is not a simulacra - but the
construction of her as an idealised woman renders her artificial. During the
shoot I arrange myself on a stage with cut-out furniture and attempt to hold
them in place. I struggle to maintain the position I have allocated myself –
that of the object of desire. On first reading these images appear to fall
neatly into a patriarchal sexual language that Mulvey describes, a construction
of sexuality that reduces the female subject into a 2-dimensional
representation. But the woman is isolated in a world of her own making – she
has created the fantasy of body image in order to appeal to the male gaze. This
is the female paradox – she is captive in the panopticon that she built up
around herself.
Cut to the Measure of Desire 2010
Cut
to the Measure of Desire is a series of performance installations that respond
to feminism and spectatorship theories; the panopticon overseer and the
resulting state of perpetual exhibitionism. Using the language of symbolism in
Dutch Bordeeltjes painting I create scenes of excessive sexuality. Like the
Flemish genre paintings, each gesture and prop is carefully chosen to symbolise
promiscuity, commerce and desire.
Reminiscent of the traditions of still-life painting and the
tableau-vivant, I pose within the scene - an imperfect being concealed within a
2-dimensional idealised world. The aim to uphold the illusion of perfection is
futile and the codes of desire crumble under the weight of the specators gaze.
BIOGRAPHY
Dawn Woolley
trained as a fine art printmaker at
In 2008 she
completed an MA in Photography at the Royal College of Art and was awarded a
prize for excellence by Land Securities and Art Source. In the spring of 2008
she undertook a three month studio residency at Cite des Arts in
Recent
exhibitions have included; “Start Your Collection” at The London Art Fair
(2009), “Fotomonth” in Krakow, Poland (2007) and solo exhibitions in South
Square Gallery, Bradford (2009), The Lighthouse Art Centre in Wolverhampton
(2006) and Warsaw Project Space in Manchester (2003). Her artwork is held in a
number of private collections in the
Dawn Woolley
currently lives and works in
