Fashion 1980-Now - Identify ONE contemporary fashion theorist - Essay Example

Fashion 1980-Now al Affiliation Fashion 1980-Now Cindy Sherman is a fashion theorist born in 1954 in Glen Ridge locatedin New Jersey. In her self-reflective films and photography, she invents myriad guises that grow from a Hollywood starlet to clown to a society matron. She concentrated on photography as a fashion artist maintaining that photography is the appropriate style of expression in a civilization that is media-dominated. She has published various works that reflect this aspect (Meskimmon, 2007). This paper will analyze Cindy Sherman’s works as a fashion theorist by creating a visual report of her works that have been of influence, controversy and dispute the fashion arena. "Untitled (#93)," 1981 In this photograph, Cindy Sherman refers to it as The black sheets and states that she thinks of a character that has just woken up from a night on the town. She states that she visualizes the character as someone who has been woken up by the sun and has a bad hangover from drinking. However, this picture depicts a person who is in bed during the day. Her face does not show any emption showing perhaps that the character is feeling empty and has her thoughts far away from the bed she is lying on. This photograph is one of Sherman’s works that has contributed to colored photography seen in contemporary fashion. It has is bright and attractive (Ioan, 2011). Untitled (#224)," 1990 The above photography by Sherman presents a horrific but comical and poignant photograph. This photograph shows a person whose face appears closely to that of a woman while the body appears like a man because of the masculinity. The background is dark enabling the color and brightness to come out clearly. This piece of work shows Sherman’s attachment to nature and human value. Here, she emphasizes the fact that having a work that expresses contradictions is very important in the development of art showing that pieces of art can capture more than one subject or present contradictory message. This comes out as of Sherman’s important works. For an artist, representing real life events and happenings through art is an important aspect. In the above photograph, Sherman shows a mother’s attachment to her baby before and after she is born. The combination of the photos shows a progression from one stage of life to another, both for the mother and the baby. In the first photograph, the mother has not given birth yet, but she shows her expectation by the way she holds the tummy and by exposing her breasts. In the second photo, the mother is depicted ready to breastfeed the baby after birth (Sherman, 2003). Sherman has been criticized for her photographs that represent sexuality and pretend porn, which has been seen to promote promiscuity. The above photograph shows a portrait in the confrontational and defiant attitude of the character. The confidence pervades throughout the photograph. The photograph shows a woman in a bed with lingerie on. The character does not represent a feel of sleep but that of life in bed perhaps sexual attractiveness. The character appears jovial and effortless. The choice of not using color in the photograph creates the bedroom atmosphere in the photograph. Therefore, it represents the sexual side of Sherman’s photography (Delaunay, 2012). Most of Sherman’s photographs are of herself in different scenarios and attires. This has seen her branded as a portraiture photographer and her works classified as tableaux. Most of her photographs are taken when she is alone in her studio but creatively. The fact that most of her photography are taken as self-portraits have brought criticisms on her work as critics point to her lack of diversity in terms of her coverage. The above photograph is an example of her own self-portrait that is taken in a creative manner. However, her work has diversity because Sherman changes drastically in her portraits where she uses high contrast. Cindy Sherman, “Untitled #463″ John and Amy Phelan The above photograph shows a piece of a new work by Sherman that represents femininity. The photograph shows women having fun together and as seen in the picture, the characters faces have smiles showing that they are happy (Russo, 1995). Sherman has been criticized for promoting feminism in her works most of which feature her self-portraits of those of other women. She has only a few photographs that have men as characters among her many photographs, which feature women. The above picture is the perfect representation of feminism in Sherman’s works. She has continued to produce such works over time without changing her style (Lemmon, n.d). Untitled Film Still #48 In this photograph, Sherman appears as a fictitious character in a scenario resembling moments in a film. In the photograph, Sherman used wigs, vintage clothing and makeup to produce a range of female personae that she took in solitary and unguarded moments of reflection (Mulvey, 1991). This photograph reflects her contribution in terms of creating film stills that are widely used in photography today. The black-and-white color represents the time at which the photograph was produced. It has since influenced the development of colored film stills in the contemporary photography. This shows the contribution that Sherman has brought into the photography and fashion arena over the years (Chaplin, 2002). Cindy Sherman, “Untitled #119″ Sherman has often been regarded as the quintessential postmodern artist who has produced works with modernist and ambiguous tendencies giving critics a hard time. Her works erode the boundary between postmodern critique of the market and marketability by function seamlessly within the market strategies of the 1980s and 1990s (Sherman, Barents & Schjeldahl, 1984). The above work is an example that can be read as a challenge to the art market and a creative marketable photograph. This has definitely helped in the development of postmodern art theory. Sherman’s contribution to the fashion field thus cannot be underplayed because of the kind of photography she has created overtime (Bowlen & Zimmerman, 2009). In conclusion, there is no artist that has made an extended career of photography like Cindy Sherman. Irrespective of the fact that her photographs are taken of Sherman, it is impossible to classify her works as self-portraits. Sherman has also made her reputation by staging as an unnamed actor in undefined B films, pretend porn stars, make-believe television characters and an undifferentiated woman in ambivalent emotional states among others. Overall, her work is excellent pieces of art constructed as a theatre of femininity. References Bowlen, J. E., & Zimmerman, P. M. (2009). Body language: the presence and absence of Cindy Sherman, Sherrie Levine and Barbara Kruger. Chaplin, E. (2002). Sociology and visual representation. Routledge. Delaunay, M (2012). Cindy Sherman at The San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. Retrieved from May 9, 2014 from http://sfartenthusiast.com/2012/07/cindy-sherman-at-the-san-francisco-museum-of-modern-art/ Ioan, D. (2011). A Woman’s 69 Looks–Cindy Sherman’s Untitled Film Stills–. Ekphrasis, (1), 152-159. Lemmon, N. (n.d). THE SHERMAN PHENOMENA: The Image of Theory or A Foreclosure of Dialectical Reasoning? Retrieved from May 9, 2014 from http://www.brickhaus.com/amoore/magazine/Sherman.html Meskimmon, M. (2007). Chronology through cartography: mapping 1970s feminist art globally. Mulvey, L. (1991). A Phantasmagoria of the female body: The work of Cindy Sherman. New Left Review, 188, 136-50. Russo, M. J. (1995). The female grotesque: Risk, excess, and modernity. Psychology Press. Sherman, C. (Ed.). (2003). Cindy Sherman: the complete untitled film stills. The Museum of Modern Art. Sherman, C., Barents, E., & Schjeldahl, P. (1984). Cindy Sherman. Schirmer/Mosel. Read More