35
|
Joan Snyder
My Maggie
, 2000
Lithograph, etching
20½"
x 23½"
This very personal print uses the visual metaphor of “graffiti”
to choose and reject several potential, loving names applied to
Snyder’s life partner. Viewing this subtle, powerful work, one is
forced to rethink ones own choices and the power of naming.
Choice is at the heart of this subject. Each individual is just that:
an individual, and more than any other work in this exhibition,
My Maggie
rejoices in freedom. Snyder’s signature style of
incorporating the written word is a banner of affirmation.
Robbin Ami Silverberg
Freud’s Wallpaper: Home Sweet Home
, 2006-2012
Painted pulp, cutouts, inkjet on canvas
7’10"
x 34"
The background panel contains a text by Sigmund Freud representing
his non-comprehension of women: “Science tells you something that
runs counter to your expectations and is probably calculated to confuse
your feelings. It draws your attention to the fact that portions of the male
sexual apparatus also appear in women’s bodies, though in an atrophied
state, and vice versa in the alternative case. It regards their occurrence
as indications of bisexuality, as though an individual is not a man or a
woman but always both” (Sigmund Freud’s lecture “On Femininity,”
1933).
The spaces between the letters are cut out, allowing the words
to tangle and represent the confusion and mental anguish of two groups
of people: men and women struggling with gender roles that have been
foisted upon them while not wishing to change their actual gender, and
intersexuals, who are born with recognizably both masculine and femi-
nine physical characteristics, and occupy the space between male and
female. It should be noted that Freud’s use of the word “bisexuality”
refers to the original meaning of the term: “of or relating to both sexes.”
