Rooted in an analysis of second-wave feminist art critique, Feminephemera plays with and ultimately rejects the notion of the feminine body as studio ephemera within an overwhelmingly male history of painting. The work is a narration of the studio paradigm through an active and embodied expression of the feminine; a multiplicitous and curious body that actively constructs and directs its own narrative.
Sarah Margaret explores connections between process/ mess in painting and abject body functions, rooted in ‘monstrous’ femininity, where the project began. Solitary moments of contemplation, of tension, and of action are interrogated through gestures of painting, emphasised in colour and line. The studio space acts as a stage for the circular construction and dissolution of the feminine subject; she is both painter and Muse, at once absorbing and absorbed by the studio environment as she interacts with the space.
Dark, dank, empty, slimy, mysterious, foreboding: A moment of contemplation in the studio, oil on canvas, 200 x 200cm
Considering the Beguiling Nature of Fruits, oil on stretched paper, 114 x 76 each
Feminephemera, installation view
The Medusa’s Head, oil on canvas, 180 x 200cm
Construction-Dissolution Continuum, oil on canvas, 190 x 120cm
Research
Garden Page, Feminephemera, zine
Gallery Page, Feminephemera, zine