The sad
story of Saartjie Baartman, whose life has influenced black artists. She was a
Khoikhoi woman who was persuaded by an English doctor, William Dunlop to travel
to England where she would make a fortune, instead she was paraded around
England as a sexual freak, for the public to gawk at, " the stage
two feet high, along which she was led by her keeper and exhibited like a wild
beast, being obliged to walk, stand or sit as he ordered". She was then
taken to Paris in 1814 where she continued to be exhibited and humiliated, she
became a subject of medical and scientific research where they named her
genital condition the ‘Hottentot apron’. The saddest part of Baartman’s life is
that she died alone in 1816, the muse de l’homme in Paris took a death-cast of
her body, removing her skeleton but pickled her brain and genitals in a jar;
even after death she was subjected to public scrutiny and humiliation.
However artists such as Lyle Ashton and Renee Valerie Cox recreated the image of the “Hottentot Venus 2000”. In my opinion Harris and Cox are identifying themselves with their African culture and understanding the meaning of being an African women in the 21st century. Harris discusses the meaning of the image and what it depicts “reclaiming of the image of the Hottentot Venus is a way of exploring my own psychical identification with the image at the level of spectacle. I am playing with what it means to be an African diasporic artist producing and selling work in a culture that is by and large narcissistically mired in the debasement and objectification of blackness. And yet, I see my work less as a didactic critique and more as an interrogation of the ambivalence around the body.” Inevitably the artist wants the viewer to scruntinize her body and ignorantly stereotype her as a black women who is provocatively dressed, instead of seeing it as a political statement to people who prejudice against African culture and sexuality. Her pose displays strength and power that instantly grabbed my attention, admiring her courage which shines a mirror on our prejudices and ignorance as a society .
However artists such as Lyle Ashton and Renee Valerie Cox recreated the image of the “Hottentot Venus 2000”. In my opinion Harris and Cox are identifying themselves with their African culture and understanding the meaning of being an African women in the 21st century. Harris discusses the meaning of the image and what it depicts “reclaiming of the image of the Hottentot Venus is a way of exploring my own psychical identification with the image at the level of spectacle. I am playing with what it means to be an African diasporic artist producing and selling work in a culture that is by and large narcissistically mired in the debasement and objectification of blackness. And yet, I see my work less as a didactic critique and more as an interrogation of the ambivalence around the body.” Inevitably the artist wants the viewer to scruntinize her body and ignorantly stereotype her as a black women who is provocatively dressed, instead of seeing it as a political statement to people who prejudice against African culture and sexuality. Her pose displays strength and power that instantly grabbed my attention, admiring her courage which shines a mirror on our prejudices and ignorance as a society .
References: http://www.southafrica.info/about/history/saartjie.htm (Accessed: 24 February 2012)
http://confederatearticles.wordpress.com/2011/06/10/article%C2%B7of%C2%B7inspiration-renee-cox/ (Accessed: 24 February 2012)
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