In the last decade taking selfies turned into a dangerous collective obsession: selfies offer many of us the chance to instantly post visual chronicles of every single (un)meaningful instant and fleeting moment happening in our lives, but they also give perennial nightmares to all those among us who hate having their picture taken. Posted on social media or simply forgotten in the recesses of an abandoned smartphone or micro memory card, our selfies remain confined to the intangible digital realm.
Pondering about selfies and the phenomenon of face altering apps, in 2017 renowned artist Cindy Sherman started posting a series of selfies on her Instagram account. The portraits were created using various face-altering platforms available for smartphones that deconstructed and reassembled the image of the artist, creating new grotesques and imaginary personae.
Sherman is known for her photographic series exploring the notion of identity and challenging it: for decades the artist has transformed herself through a variety of ingenious disguises such as costumes and silicone masks. From film star to clown, from housewife to fashion icon, Sherman analysed through her gender fluid images and the typology of faces and figures she explored, the role of women in multiple situations.
Portrait after portrait, Sherman created ambiguous identities, like a clever shape-shifter, remaining always in control of her body, and playing the double role of subject and object.
Yet her selfies were too small in format to be reproduced and upscaled in a high-quality image photography, so, rather than confining them to social media or digital supports, Sherman decided to give them a sort of unexpected physicality and elevate them through a traditional craft, transforming them into tapestries.
Currently on display at ARoS Aarhus Kunstmuseum in Denmark (until 5th June), the tapestries are a way to turn technology into crafts.
There's usually parody, irony and theatricality in her works, but her tapestries take the digital media to a new level as they were created by master artisans in Belgium where tapestry-making has been a highly valued practice since the 15th century.
Translating pixels into stitches actually worked pretty well in this case: from afar the portraits look almost painted, but close up the dense woven patterns are revealed. The cotton, wool and acrylic yarns give the selfies new depths, besides, while we enjoy selfies visually, the tufted effect adds a new tactile value to the original digital format, engaging another sense, the touch, which usually gets neglected when we talk about digital art.
The tapestry medium ends up emphasizing the alterations of Sherman's appearances: aged, sporting a beard, with her arms or neck distorted or morphed into a strange creature with lilac skin and hair, Sherman proves that her characters can't be confined to the image, but can be translated into other mediums.
For Sherman the selfie is another mask, another way to perform her roles, and the medium of the tapestry is just one interpretation of her multiple identities, assumed and genuine, fake and real.
By transforming new, artificial, temporary, ephemeral and imaginary bodies into permanent ones made of yarns through the tapestries, Sherman turns something familiar, ephemeral and superficial yet usually fun as a selfie into something disturbing, disquieting, kitsch, grotesque and even uncomfortable.
Tapestry, a medium used in previous centuries for decorative panels, artworks and portraits made for nobility and the wealthy, turns in this case into a vehicle to comment on modern personality consumption on digital platforms.
"People might think the use of tapestry is quaint and outmoded," states the curator of the exhibition at ARoS, Juliana Engberg. "But Sherman mines her material for maximum effect, exploring not only identity but also playing with the visual field of abstraction and realism. With tapestry, she has found a material that warps and weaves in partnership with the pixel, and it is exciting to be able to work with and think about these unexpected works. They reveal more and more with looking and thinking," she concludes.
Image credits for this post
Installation photos of Cindy Sherman's Tapestries at ARoS Aarhus Kunstmuseum, 2023, courtesy of ARoS Aarhus Kunstmuseum, Denmark.
Comments