I conceived of the Medusa Portraits series to express some of the complex feelings I had and continue to have about aging and death. Nests are a potent image for me as a symbol of order, home, and stability -- a symbol of the (futile) effort of trying, over a lifetime, to hold the pieces together, to form something that protects us from the effects of time. The eggs, of course, also evoke a sense of urgency, time, and fragility – our (re)productive lives are finite. We try to create order when we’ve known all along that chaos, in the end, will rule.
Women in Western culture have historically been associated with earth, decay, and death. In Christian iconography it was a woman who made the pact with a snake, resulting in the exile of men from Eden and forever instituting their mortality. And, of course, in Greek mythology, Medusa was a Gorgon, one of the oldest kinds of being, half human half monster – she was always presented in art and literature as female with venomous snakes in place of her hair and those who looked at her face would turn to stone. In most versions of the story, she was beheaded by Perseus, who never looked at her directly but approached her by looking in his shield turned mirror. This narrative portrays female aging (and female agency) as that which is monstrous, as that which is a threat that needs to be subdued. And the ancient narrative has carried its weight forward through history into the present -- think of the Salem witch trials and whom they targeted. And it’s hard to ignore the very recent remarks by JD Vance about “childless cat ladies” as not having a full stake in America.
Although my photos don’t include snakes as an obvious trope, the title, Medusa Portraits, frames these images of the aging-woman-as-Medusa strategically to deconstruct certain cultural stereotypes of female aging and agency by linking the Medusa myth to ordinary women, strong women, women who look just like us. Created and sustained through a male perspective, I believe the Medusa story too often has reflected male fear of women more than it has reflected women’s own experience. In my portraits, I am trying to reframe Medusa’s image in a way that more accurately reflects my experience as an aging woman. I want us to look these women straight in the eye and have them look back without fearing them. They are strong and vulnerable at the same time. They are real and they are not monstrous.
Women in Western culture have historically been associated with earth, decay, and death. In Christian iconography it was a woman who made the pact with a snake, resulting in the exile of men from Eden and forever instituting their mortality. And, of course, in Greek mythology, Medusa was a Gorgon, one of the oldest kinds of being, half human half monster – she was always presented in art and literature as female with venomous snakes in place of her hair and those who looked at her face would turn to stone. In most versions of the story, she was beheaded by Perseus, who never looked at her directly but approached her by looking in his shield turned mirror. This narrative portrays female aging (and female agency) as that which is monstrous, as that which is a threat that needs to be subdued. And the ancient narrative has carried its weight forward through history into the present -- think of the Salem witch trials and whom they targeted. And it’s hard to ignore the very recent remarks by JD Vance about “childless cat ladies” as not having a full stake in America.
Although my photos don’t include snakes as an obvious trope, the title, Medusa Portraits, frames these images of the aging-woman-as-Medusa strategically to deconstruct certain cultural stereotypes of female aging and agency by linking the Medusa myth to ordinary women, strong women, women who look just like us. Created and sustained through a male perspective, I believe the Medusa story too often has reflected male fear of women more than it has reflected women’s own experience. In my portraits, I am trying to reframe Medusa’s image in a way that more accurately reflects my experience as an aging woman. I want us to look these women straight in the eye and have them look back without fearing them. They are strong and vulnerable at the same time. They are real and they are not monstrous.
