Ongoing virtual residency Agora Digital Art and Metaxa Studio, 2022 (project in progress) and supported by a Time – Space – Money Bursary a-n The Artists Information Company and Arts Council England, 2022
Visit the residency in Mozilla hubs
A gang of naked middle-aged female avatars descends from the savage waters of the foaming ocean interspersed with blood. The women have different shapes and sizes, and their faces are crowned with mohawk hairstyles, not unlike a parrot’s ruffled crown. The fantastic imagery is inspired by a series of self-portraits the artist took when turning fifty and enacted spontaneous performances to connect with the natural elements.
The work challenges the construction and portrayal of sexualized female avatars in the digital world and the constant search for perfection that keeps reiterating the idea of the fantasized female body as an object of desire always resembling/representing traditional cannons of beauty based on youth and sculptural bodies.
The immersive format of extended reality (VR and AR, Mozilla Hubs) enables the visitor to observe the beauty of the ageing body and the signs of the natural passing of time from all angles and from extreme close. They witness the women embracing their body as natural and becoming part of the natural world and the pulsating earth and also becoming part of it themselves.
During the research period, middle – aged women were asked to describe their body in a few words and upon those notes the artist created the avatars and visuals displaying the anonymously collected testimonies.
When I see myself in the mirror, I am surprised by what I see. I do not feel as old and as fat as I look. So when I have hot flashes (10 years and counting), or cannot carry that heavy box, or walk with stiff ankles when get out of bed in the morning, I feel as if my body has betrayed me. I have never worn makeup, never cared for fashion, and never thought myself beautiful, though many say I am. Yet, sometimes, when I look in that mirror, I can see it. Despite the wrinkles and cellulite and the hot flashes and the stiff ankles.
Voluptuous. Sometimes rigid. Sometimes porous, taking in external forces, which sometimes are welcomed sometimes definitely and violently not. Flowing. Sometimes, though, boarded up behind barbed electric wires.
It is a home. Thin, old, lovely, warm.
Good, athletic, medium height and weight. Haven’t changed since I was 16. I feel better in my skin than when I was 20, but the body – even if unchanged – remembers all the mental and physical shocks endured in life. Is that what we call “experience”?
My body. Is a familiar friend. She is always with me. Sometimes close and sometimes distant. She is pretty reliable, but getting dehydrated. dry bits are flaking away. Maybe she is leaving me one skin flake at a time. A gentle anxiety and feeling of performing myself is mostly present. It is a relief when I forget to perform and laugh or concentrate on something difficult or deeply pleasurable such as drawing.
Powerful. Empathetic. When I was younger I felt as though my body didn’t have any edges as though I was just an amorphous thing that blended with everything and I hated it. I was very skinny. Now I am more squidgy but feel more certain of where my edges are – I feel more defined. Grounded but not heavy. Also a bit imperil, menaced or threatened by illness witnessed not in my own body but friends/ family of similar age but then I imagine it in my own. Roaring.
My body doesn’t live up to the quality of my mind – flabby, sagging, crepe skin – physically still strong, healthy I am trapped in an aging body whereas my mind is still young.