I see a woman's face closed up. She is covered by veil except around her eyes. She has black eyes and black haired eyebrows. She is wearing black eyeliner, and she has a tanned skin color. She has all writing on her face and the veil. I also see the background, which matches her veil, white and filled with writings. Her eyes are looking directly at the camera, and her right eye kind of squeezing.
She is an Arabic woman. She is a Muslim. Her right eye kind of squeezing sort of tell that she is saying something. I cannot tell what she is saying since I do not understand the language the writings are written. According to the article, henna is very important to Moroccan women and their lives. Henna is associated with all the big events like puberty, attracting for husband, first child and so on. In Islamic callingraphy, the women seem to be entrapped, but it is a form of decoration that marks happiest and most important moments in their life (Edwynn Houk Gallery). She says that her works are expressions of her history, and also is a reflections on Arab women's life. She makes a good point that "art can only come from the heart of an individual artist". And she also says that her work is not a representation of Arab but an exploration because there is the range of traditions and laws in different Arab nations. Public spaces were men's possess in the culture, whereas women were restricted in private. Also, "Lalla Essaydi studied Orentalist painters who have portrayed Arab women as sexual objects for male's fantasy" (IAM). Then what is she trying to do with all her works? She says, "In my art, I wish to present myself through multiple lenses — as artist, as Moroccan, as traditionalist, as Liberal, as Muslim. In short, I invite viewers to resist stereotypes." Lalla Essaydi She is trying to break the stereotype and bring out the different images and perspectives on Arabic women. The image above is very strong and powerful in this sense. The woman is at the center of the photo, and especially the woman is huge in the photo that photo does not capture the whole body of her. Then the photo focuses on her EYES. Her eyes are looking DIRECTLY with confidence and with some pride that is shown through her right eye. She has got all the writings on her skin, veil, and background. She sends a message through the photograph. Essaydi says, "Ultimately, I wish for my work to be as vividly present and yet as elusive as "woman" herself — not simply because she is veiled or turns away, but because she is still in progress." "Converging Territories #24″ by Lalla Essaydi The word 'she is still in progress' tells that we cannot confined Arabic woman as something because they are changing. We cannot define them in our stereotype. Edwynn Houk Gallery explains that "Essaydi's photography provides a contemporary reflection on an iconography that stretches at least as far back as the Orientalist imagery of nineteenth century artists such as Ingres, Delacroix, and Gérôme". Furthermore, since the calligraphy is a decorations that mark the happiest moment of Arabic women's lives, it shows that the women have lives. They matter.
"Lalla Essaydi." Edwynn Houk Gallery -. N.p., n.d. Web. 30 Oct. 2015.
"The Women of Lalla Essaydi - IAM - Intense Art Magazine." IAM Intense Art Magazine. N.p., 03 July 2014. Web. 29 Oct. 2015.
I see people kissing in a place. The person on the left from the audience side is wearing a hat, white t-shairt and a sneaker in white and pink. This person acts like a man, sitting with the legs apart, but still look feminine in over all look like skin and everything. The other person is sitting on the top of the other. This woman is wearing an earring, a women top, and shorts. She is kissing smiling. She is also wearing a dress shoe for woman. She has short-long hair. There are lots of machines.
This person acts like a man, sitting with the legs apart, but still look feminine in over all look like skin and everything. And the other woman looks more feminine wearing an earring and a women top and short. This place looks like either a kitchen or a work place. These two must be in love and feel pleasure from each other at this moment. They are happy together.
Obviously, Zanele Muholi is a visual activist of black lesbian. She was a lesbian herself, and she tries to support lesbian through her photography. However, I was wondering how it was going to work. Then, the article answered my question, "Xingwana's act of turning away from the exhibition…might serve to challenge and even overturn the conventions that govern our gaze" (Thomas 39). This kind of work can cause two different response from the audiences, positive or negative. Then, what is she trying to do through her photographs of lesbians? According to Susan Sontag, although the camera indeed captures the reality, "photographs are as much an interpretation of the world…" (39). She also made a good point that now we cannot imagine the life without a camera. The life is not alive without being taken as a photograph in our contemporary world. People make interpretations on photographs either in stadium or punctum. We make stadium judgment through education, civility, or politeness, which are made generally by everybody, especially people within the same culture. On the other hand, people also make personal interpretation through personal connection to the work, which is punctum. Then, is Muholi is trying to make a positive stimuli in people so that they can make a positive interpretation about black lesbian? She made a movement of lesbian subjectivity and brought a light into lesbian life through her queering work. However, I personally do not get a positive response from looking at any type of erotic works no matter it is homosexual or heterosexual. I believe all our body parts have to stay secret and private. Our sexuality is beautiful when it stays privately. However, I guess as he believes that the moment being captured by photo makes the lives really are alive, she captures lesbians to show the world that lesbians are real and they matter.
I see a Victorian timed/based picture that people are dressed in Victorian dressese. I see a black man in European suit placed at the center of the photo. He is looking at the camera in confidence. He is surrounded by two white women trying to get attention from him, but he does not even give them a f***. And there is a white guy on the bed touch at black man's woman's booty. There is another guy on the right bottom corner of the photo, fainted out or sleeping. I see two pairs at the back. One of the two pairs, one white guy is behind a white lady trying to have sexual pleasure, but the woman seems to be not in the same mood. She is thinking of something focused. There is a bald man standing staring. He is the only one dressed up knit with straight posture in the photo. He is doing something with his hands.
The black guy is the main character in this photo, seem dominant and powerful. The guy at the right bottom corner seems to be hung over or got exhausted from chasing the girl's attention next to him, who is focused on the black guy. The bald man standing looks like a servant, not involved in this situation. He is doing something with his hands, perhaps serving drinks?
Shonibare is focused on globalization. Reading his answers to Okwui Enwezor's questions reminded me of American Asians who do not possess much of home culture in them but is more modernized. Shonibare is the same way. He says that he has never been to African traditional villages himself that he cannot produce his home culture from his soul (167). Because when the Europeans say "The villege", it is a Western point of view for him, and it would be the same way for himself since he did not grow up in that environment; it is not his own thing. He says that when he was growing up in Nigeria, he did not choose anything, but when he moved to Europe, he had to choose his blackness. Then I see how he portrays his blackness in his artworks. He is definitely not focused on the tradition, Africa, or his condition, but in globalization, modernism, international art, and global issues (166-167). Then he pursues confusion through his art work (167). Furthermore, his work is political, and his center of his practice is 'pleasure'.
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