GORGON

The word Gorgon was the name given to a goddess/monster, the most celebrated being the unfortunate and mortal Medusa. Her beautiful locks of hair channed Poisedon, thus angering Athene, who turned Medusa’s hair into a nest of serpents. Her gaze had the power of turning men to stone; however, Perseus used his shield as a mirror to deflect her stare, enabling him to cut off her head. Perseus brought the head to Athene’s temple, where the mounted head was placed on Athene's aegis/shield, where it retained its power. Representations of Medusa and other Gorgons are frequently seen in temples from the Greek, Roman and Etruscan empires. Other examples are found in forms made of clay, plaster and wood, often distorted and grotesque.

Jungian psychoanalysis locates Gorgons as archetypes, serving as symbols of a dangerous female sexuality. In the work of the Symbolists, Surrealists, and Expressionists, the female form, often nude, was associated with the unconscious. The more contemporaiy femme fatale can be a combination of a threatening/repulsive, and alluring/seductive woman.

This dichotomy of the beautiful/grotesque is a theme throughout histoty. Building on the complexity of these ideas found in ancient myths, psychology, and artistic movements, my work embraces visual depictions of woman as feral and untamed. My pictures, both in color and black and white, challenge our historical and cultural ideas of women through time. I revisit these beliefs while simultaneously exposing the subjective nature of the “gaze”.

My subject matter is the self, shot with the large format 4 X 5 camera; full figure, close-up, naked, and purposely confrontational. The black and white prints are large and small, toned various colors, bleached and solarized referencing Surrealism and the self-portraits of the late Francesca Woodman. These photographs echo the past while the color pictures represent the present. Also, the manipulated black and white work is a stark contrast to the color pictures where flesh/face are rendered in a hyper-real way adding an uncivilized dimension that is inescapable. I want to introduce a new way of examining femaleness. My images explore female archetypes at a visceral level and my own experience of seeing as well as being seen.

Colleen Healy

2001