The mask in this body of work investigates various female archetypes - those often not representing the woman's true nature. It also looks closely at personas and identity - the space between what you are with others and what you are alone. Mythology and iconography is played out in the many ways women have been represented in art, cinema and literature. How do we cope with the expectations of others and still keep our integrity?
Repressed fears and desires are projected onto the female body and thus portrayed with a message that there is only one (or the other) way to be a woman, and one way to fit into archetypes created for us; the paradox of being seen (as a body) and unseen (as a subject). Joan Riviere’s seminal work “Womanliness as a Masquerade” (1929) argues that the masquerade is the symptom and the cure of women’s anxiety of trespassing the borders between domestic and public spheres, putting emphasis on her social and political experience. This is a balance between disguise and display, where she can reclaim and liberate her body and the privacy that exists in her own reflection. Additionally, the mask, or the persona, for Swiss psychiatrist Carl Jung, is the face the individual presents to the world—"a kind of mask, designed on the one hand to make a definite impression upon others, and on the other to conceal the true nature of the individual."
This body of work consists of self portraiture in disguise, blended with images of women exploring certain personas, identities, mythologies and archetypes. The mask of (presumed) female perfection; the bride, the mother, the maiden, the damsel in distress, the southern belle and the victorian woman. She is depicted in the navigation through the projected images on her.
