My Little Pretty: Images of Girls by Contemporary Women Artists

What Are You Looking At?

Staci Boris

Images of girls have long been a part of our visual culture. A motif rife with associations, the little girl has been adopted by artists as a symbol of innocence and purity. We often find her engaged in leisure and domestic activities, as in the nineteenth-century paintings of Pierre Auguste Renoir, Edgar Degas, and Mary Cassatt, as well as in an entire tradition of charming portraits. Other depictions of the little girl have been wrapped up in adult (usually male) fantasies, based on the sexual appeal of the girl as an untainted innocent, such as Paul Gauguin’s exotic beauties, Hans Bellmer’s unapologetic fetishistic constructions of grotesque dolls, and Balthus’s languorous and often contorted renditions of girls in suggestive poses. Examples of idealized girls in contemporary art include the black-and-white photographs of Jock Sturges, in which dramatically lit, unselfconscious girls pose nude for the camera, and Sally Mann’s nostalgic photographs of her own children in which she aims to capture the beauty and freedom of childhood.

Films starring young girls, including Shirley Temple comedies, Gigi, and, of course, Lolita, also reveal carefully constructed and formulaic characters made to appeal to adult men. Contemporary commercial culture continues to capitalize on an ongoing adult attraction to the tension between the virtuous or "childlike" and the erotic. This combination wields power and grabs attention. Culture critic Henry A. Giroux states,

"In the profit-driven world of advertising and fashion, the image of and culture of youth are appropriated and exploited for the high pleasure quotient they evoke. The body in this fashionscape does not represent the privileged terrain of agency, but serves as a site of spectacle and objectification, where youthful allure and sexual titillations are marketed and consumed by teens and adults who want to indulge a stylized narcissism and a self that is all surface."

Sociologist Shalene Hesser-Biber agrees that "the commodification of bodies is big business because society reinforces stereotypes of beauty to keep women in their place."

Attitudes toward women have certainly changed over the past century, largely thanks to the feminist movement, which pushed our society in a direction that eventually allowed more realistic and diverse definitions and depictions of women. Nevertheless, images of the feminine ideal are still fed to us on a daily basis. One only has to look at the recurring popularity of Barbie, the paragon of the "feminine." She remains pretty, sexless, and highheeled, even as attempts are made to round out her persona (Barbie Teacher and Barbie Pet Doctor are now available in stores amidst their more leisure-oriented counterparts). As Susan J. Douglas asserts in her journey through the pop culture of womanhood, Where the Girls Are,

"Our collective history of interacting with and being shaped by the mass media has engendered in many women a kind of cultural identity crisis. . . . [We are] pulled in opposite directions - told we were equal, yet told we were subordinate; told we could change history, yet told we were trapped by history."

Aspects of female identity - the impositions dictated by those in power versus the reality of human existence in very complex and confusing times - are being addressed by women in many disciplines. Books like Urban Girls: Resisting Stereotypes, Creating Identities exist to help both adults and girls cope with their struggles. Gloria Steinem and Andrea Johnston organized the First National Conference on Girls in early 1997 and included a workshop called "Images of Girls in the Media." A number of films shown at the 1997 Sundance Film Festival (Girls Like Us, All Over Me, Arresting Gena) also illustrate the heightened interest in creating a dialogue around the dilemmas of being a girl, focusing particularly on the issue of female sexuality.

Contemporary women artists are also tackling issues of female identity by addressing the little girl in new and provocative ways. The six women artists in My Little Pretty are reacting against stereotypical typologies of the female and of the child by creating their own figural constructs of girls that investigate different aspects of female identity and question the way women and girls are represented in our culture. These artists are not afraid to defy the taboo of representing, even manipulating children’s bodies in a way that might seem disturbing, but in fact realistically reflects the predicament of girls and women in a culture that celebrates so many contradictory notions and values. These images do not encourage lascivious behavior or sanction voyeuristic tendencies; they exist to confront, so neither the work nor the viewer can sit passively.

Kim Dingle, Judy Fox, Nicky Hoberman, Inez van Lamsweerde, Judith Raphael, and Lisa Yuskavage do not subscribe to any one ideology of femininity. Rather, all, in the spirit of critique and inquiry, and with cunning selectivity, cull from past representations and allusions to present new images of the little girl that personify current concerns. Acknowledging the little girl within and their own personal experiences of childhood, the artists explore a variety of personal, political, social, and aesthetic issues.

As women, they are reclaiming the right to self-possession while also exposing the very authority that is suspect. The works proffer fusions of lived experience, cultural constructs, historical references, and aesthetic pursuits that investigate the human, primarily female, condition.

In regard to more personal references in each individual artist’s work, the form of little girl also provides a sort of surrogate in which difficult and private concerns can be played out, allowing the artist enough distance to see things more clearly.

The artists do not attempt to hide from ugly realities. Rather, they reject the notion of the little girl as a powerless innocent, creating figures imbued with characteristics typically assigned to adults, such as sexuality and self-confidence (many co-opting successful media strategies), or inclinations often considered male, like control and violence. By mixing adult and child and male and female, they create hybrids that communicate their interest in softening and transgressing constructed behavioral codes, denying adherence to stereotypes brought about through media presentations or the expectations of another generation. Ultimately, their girls become active subjects, rather than passive objects.

The works of the six artists in My Little Pretty demonstrate the versatility of the little girl as a symbol. No longer associated with one predominant characteristic, the girl represented in this exhibition is beautiful, ugly, powerful, fearful, compliant, resistant, wise, and confused. This points to a certain freedom exercised by the artists, who subscribe neither to the strict biases of traditional feminism nor the stereotypical personas created by the media and forms of mainstream entertainment. Rather the artists acknowledge the complexity of women’s identity by claiming their prerogative, as women, to address, critique, and question any and all of its facets.

Realizing the potential of this motif, these artists have also adopted it to investigate a variety of complex social issues, such as power structure, violence, and desire, as well as issues related to the body and taboo, all current concerns relevant to people of all ages and genders. The social commentary or questioning of dominant attitudes in each work of art is often coupled with more personal expressions tied to each artist’s own experience, whether it be as an artist, a woman, or as a citizen of a community.

The prevalence of the girl in art also reflects contemporary artists' renewed interest in figuration, a mode of image-making that clearly emphasizes the human condition as the central motivation of the artwork. In seeking some commonality among this diverse group of artists, who all happen to employ a particular motif, it is difficult to ignore the rather disturbing quality of many of their works of art. Much of this comes from the occasionally blatant, but more often subtle references to the existence of evil (Peter Schjeldahl's "domain of the fiend") or the threat of impending danger.

The cruel smiles of van Lamsweerde’s beauties and the vicious nature of Dingle’s brutes suggest the devilish impulses that are a part of us all. In turn, the fear on the face of Fox’s Sphinx, the curious and searching expressions of a number of Yuskavage’s and Raphael’s creations, and the shrewd stares of Hoberman’s characters tell us that something is up, something that these girls sense, as well as something that these mature artists know. In a society where violence, mistreatment, and social pressure are factors of everyday life, whether it be on the streets, in the media, or in the home, it is not surprising that these artists have produced works that are discomforting—works that illustrate the anxiety inherent in growing up today.