YASUMASA MORIMURA / WORKS IN PROFILE / SECTION 2
MORIMURA’S OWN MALE JAPANESE FACE TRANSPOSED ONTO THESE ICONIC AND IDEALISED IMAGES OF FEMALES FROM WESTERN ART HISTORY ASKS FURTHER QUESTIONS ABOUT THE REPRESENTATION OF GENDER AND THE ASSUMPTION THAT WESTERN CULTURE IS A GLOBAL HISTORY. Wayne Tunnicliffe, senior curator Contemporary art, Art Gallery of New South An incomplete world, catalogue p57
From the late 1970s photographer-artists such as Cindy Sherman explored how visual identity and a sense of self are shaped by images in the popular media, for example films, magazines and television. Through photographing themselves in the guise of already familiar ‘types’, such as ‘the secretary’ or the ‘pin up girl’, and in common media genres, it was as if the artist was an actor in so many pre-ordained movie plots, TV serials or photo-essays. Traditional ideas of the self-portrait as revealing an essential identity were turned on their head and selfhood became a deferred series of self-images that could be exchanged at will. Simultaneously, other artists such as Sherrie Levine were exploring the legacy of art history, through rephotographing images by earlier photographers such as Edward Weston, and thereby examining how the experience of the unique artwork had been affected by the endless reproductions that photography and the mass media had made possible, a critique that had been prefigured by Walter Benjamin’s highly influential essay from 1936, ‘The work of art in the age of mechanical reproduction’. Many other artists also began appropriating images from earlier painters and reworked them in their own art to question originality and the ways in which culture participated in certain exclusionary power relationships, such as the absence of women and other races from Western art history. These strands of self-representation, mediainfluenced imagery, appropriation and a critical examination of art history come together in Yasumasa Morimura’s photographs. Daughter of art history: Princess B 1989 is a photograph based on one of Diego Velázquez’s last paintings, Infanta Margarita in blue 1659. Typically, Morimura’s version stars himself, standing behind the improbable cut-out version of the Infanta’s dress he constructed in his studio. What is even more improbable is the detail in the image: the Infanta’s left hand now has beautifully manicured long red nails while her right hand holds a parasol. On the stand behind her, the small sculpture of what appears to be a dog in the original has been replaced with two modern soft toys. On the wall behind these is a very recent looking clock. In Angels descending a staircase 1991, Morimura has depicted himself as the angels in Edward Burne-Jones enigmatic painting The golden stairs 1880. Morimura, however, has doubled the original composition and now the angels descend both sides of the staircase as if in an over-the-top Busby Berkeley choreographed Hollywood musical number.
K–6 LOOKING AND MAKING ACTIVITIES VISUAL ART: Find an image of Diego Velázquez’s painting Infanta Margarita 1659. Compare the painting with Morimura’s staged photograph. Identify the elements that the artist did not include from Velazquez’s painting. Draw a picture of yourself as Daughter of art history: princess B in your own contemporary environment. Consider the objects that are important to you and include them in your artwork. SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY: Locate photographic portraits taken in the late 19th century. Compare the poses and facial expressions to the work of Velazquez and Morimura. Research photographic techniques from the late 19th century. Explore why early photographic portraits seem so serious. Stage your own portraits and photograph yourself and classmates in similar poses. MUSIC: Research composers of the 17th and late 20th century. Listen to music from these periods and compare. Imagine the sounds you could hear if you were sitting next to the Daughter of art history: princess B. Compose a piece of music. Include elements of music you have collected and incorporate sounds you may hear from the objects in the artwork.
7–12 FRAMING QUESTIONS Identify how Morimura has constructed this image. Why has Morimura deliberately created a composition that looks kitsch? Discuss how Morimura draws our attention to the nature of constructed histories and gender stereotypes. Can you define this image as a self-portrait or is the artist placing himself in the role of the subject to make a particular statement? Discuss. Survey Morimura’s photographic practice. Explore how Morimura uses irony and parody in the appropriation of iconic artworks of Western art history. Does the success of his photographs rely on the audience being familiar with the original artwork? Debate in class. Research the work of Sherrie Levine, who photographed reproductions of paintings and photographs and presented these as her own works of art. Compare Levine’s work with the work of Morimura. How does the work of these artists challenge the notion of the original idea in contemporary art practice?
Both these works call upon the ‘aura’ and beauty of the original paintings, and at a passing glance they could be seen as being the heirs to this art history. But at a second glance the gold frames, stagy drama, thick varnish over the surface to emulate a painterly quality and ‘incorrect’ contemporary elements add to a sense of post-pop kitsch, anathema to any traditional sense of beauty. Morimura’s own male Japanese face transposed onto these iconic and idealised images of females from Western art history asks further questions about the representation of gender and the assumption that Western culture is a global history. WT
AN INCOMPLETE WORLD EDUCATION KIT AGNSW
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