Relevant Artists
Relevant Artists
Paula Rego
Dame Maria Paula Figueiroa Rego was born on the 26th January 1935 in Portugal. She studied at the Slade School of Fine Art and was an exhibiting member of the London Group alongside artists such as David Hockney and Frank Auerbach. Rego's work can now be seen in many public and private institutions around the world, such as in the collections of the British Council and Arts Council of England, and the Tate Gallery.
She is most known for her paintings and prints of nursery rhymes and folk tales. Her style evolved from abstract pieces to representational, art that represents some aspects of reality, in a straightforward way. Her artwork almost perfectly aligns with my aim for the project, taking well known stories from our childhood, but showing them through a distorted, disturbed image.
In this depiction of the well known fairy tale, Snow White, Rego alters our image of Snow White from a young peaceful sleeping child to a middle aged woman in pain. She is painted just after eating the poisoned apple, falling off of the chair upside down, with her legs exposed and elevated. The way her body lies also portrays the pain she is in, her feet tensing and her hands grasping at her skirt and neck, as if she's trying to hold on for her life. This is said to have been done to show what a female goes through during her life, showing the 'physical and psychological violation age plays in a females life'.
This piece made from pastels on paper shows the seemingly innocent tale of a wooden boy made real, into a surreal unnerving scene. The piece shows a carpenter holding a skinny, rigid boy laying over his lap, rubbing a red rag over his body. The unnatural way the boy is positioned, hovering over the space between the man's legs, instead of drooping down when unsupported makes the viewer question if the boy is alive, deceased or carved out of wood. She guides the viewer to suspect the boy is some sort of realistic, but inanimate doll through his positioning, however the act of washing the boy points towards the man caring for him. He wants to look after him as if he is real, does the man believe in the fantasy of his carving coming to life? Or does he wish for the love and affection a 'real boy' could bring him?
Hans Bellmer
Hans Bellmer was born in 1902 in the city of Kattowitz which was part of the German Empire, now Katowice, Poland. He is most famous for the creation of a series of dolls as well as the photographs of them. The project is said to have been influenced by events in his personal life, and takes credit for provoking a physical crisis in his father after introducing topics around his resentment towards a 'severe and humourless paternal authority'.
In his pieces, Bellmer incorporated the 'ball joint' which was inspired by a pair of sixteenth century articulated wooden dolls in the Kaiser Friedrich Museum. Jonathon Hirschfeld has claimed that Bellmer started his doll project to oppose the racism of the Nazi Party by stating that he would make no work that would support the 'new state'.
The doll was made from wood, plaster, metal rods, nuts and bolts, forming a structure that represented a young girl. He made a few of these 'dolls', each missing something. The first doll was never pictured with its eyes in place, only on the floor next to it like marbles, the second further exploring this idea. It had two pelvises, two sets of legs, one arm, and the original doll's head and hand, but with no visible eyes.
Paul Eluard (French poet and another member of the surrealist group Bellmer was in) noted the absence of the eyes in a collection of prose poems he created for Bellmer's second doll, which Bellmer then published alongside his own essays.
What fascinates me most about these dolls is how Bellmer was so concerned with the dolls gaze above other parts of the body. Purposely leaving them blind by not giving them eyes at all, or leaving them separate, almost like an accessory. Bellmer wrote a lot about his obsession with young girls and knowing this whilst looking at his work shows his clear paedophilic intentions. His inspiration for the dolls came from his teenage cousin Ursula who he was sexually attracted to, but could not outwardly pursue her. The dolls became a substitution on which he could project his desires, without facing backlash or resentment.
These dolls highlights how the world we live in is not always as innocent as it may seem. Dolls are typically innocent children's toys, yet Bellmer has distorted them to fit his own agenda. It shows how even the most mundane and common objects can be changed or perceived differently from the original.
Johnson Tsang
Johnson Tsang was born in 1960 in Hong Kong, where he is still based. He uses many realist sculptural techniques alongside a surrealistic imagination to create his 'serene yet sinister' sculptures.
Tsang is a self-taught artist, and is particularly interested in depicting babies as a way to explore the perspective of one's inner child. His work addresses themes such as innocence and the subconscious, but is rooted in more somber realities of the world. He spent thirteen years in the police force which still provides inspiration as the darkness and violence of crimes he encountered changed his creative perspective.
In all of Tsang's pieces, each face is extremely expressive which perfectly highlights how expressions are a fundamental and universal language. Tsang has expressed that the only thing people can rely on, are our feelings towards each other and how you can send messages without saying a word. Each face portrays a different emotion, suffering, sadness, glee, and excitement.
To Tsang, 'love' doesn't only represent the pretty things, it's a combination of all our emotions and feelings, both positive and negative. Hate and fear are parts of love, not the absence of it. He talks about our feelings of sadness when someone leaves or hurts us, and how that feeling of sadness couldn't exist without love. You can't be sad over a loss, if you didn't love it to begin with.
Friends in the Box
This piece is another example of Tsang using facial expressions to change the perception of a piece. If all the baby heads were identical, it wold become creepy and unnerving to look at, like a stranger staring from across the street. But having each head showing a different expression, it becomes fun and playful, like a group of kids at a park.
The simple change from one emotion to many changes the perception of the piece entirely and this is what I love most about it. How we as humans can be so easily swayed by one simple adjustment. This fragility we possess can so easily be distorted by others that it makes me wonder, how much of our identity is our own, and what have we been moulded into?
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