silver gelatin prints embroidered and painted with blood, then mounted onto canvas, 1999-present
In each of the pieces that make up the Insect Collection I have embroidered the body of an insect on top of the nude female figure. In all of the images I act as both the artist and the model. The embroidered medium is usually associated with craft or “handiwork”, and is traditionally considered women’s art.
The combination of blood and stitches are reminiscent of reconstructive surgery and further emphasize the idea of perfecting body parts, of changing the grotesque into the beautiful, or the beautiful into the grotesque, and the whole into scrutinized, fragmented parts.
The insects and their Latin names are realized in a paint of blood, and so allude to the rigor associated with medicine and the classification of natural phenomena. Blood symbolizes intimacy and the vehicle of life. It can also speak of inheritance and identity, birth and death. Insects are emblematic of collecting, a cataloguing of types and parts of the body.
The Insect Backs are made by scanning the back or reverse side of the photograph while the embroidery is in progress, and are oversize pigmented digital prints.
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