“You will always be fond of me. I represent to you all the sins you never had the courage to commit.” – Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Grey
Inevitably, an artist is described in a few words. Male artists who are unconventional or controversial are enfant terribles. They can be handsome, like Marlon Brando. Or conventionally unattractive – think Serge Gainsbourg, Jean Paul Satre, or Damian Hirst. Either way, their bold work makes them more desirable. They are sexy because they are enfant terribles.
A man can be an enfant terrible because he paints sexy women. John Currin’s classic oil paintings of women ranging from soft porn seduction to distorted parodies of female bodies are described as: joyful vulgarity; between old master and cartoon; and an exploration of the taboo. He is critically acclaimed with an estimated net worth of $1.43 billion.
When an enfant terrible stands up for himself he is admired. When a woman artist stands up for herself, she is a bitch – or, as I was recently described, a cunt.
Occasionally, a woman artist is an enfant terrible. But only if she meets certain conditions: she has aged out of sexual desirability; does not make sexy art; or rejected her sexuality. Think Tracey Emin after she declared, at 50, that she no longer had sex. Or Kathy Acker, with her weightlifter physique, cropped hair and work that was sexually taboo – not sexually desirable.
When a woman makes artwork that is sexual and visually appealing, she is often dismissed as trite or accused of using her sexuality to advance her career. I’ve faced an odd yet expansive range of false accusations, from sex with art critics to sexually manipulating people I’ve never met into buying my art.
A woman artist who is strong, unconventional, controversial, sexy, or dares to make sexual art is not an enfant terrible. She is a bad girl.
We love or love-to-hate the bad girl. She is less respected as an artist. Few people can get past their emotional response to sex appeal in art made by a woman to examine how well the work is made. Desire, envy, the frustration of unrequited lust – or failed attempts to dominate her – overpower aesthetic sensibilities. Unlike the enfant terrible, she has an expiry date linked to her sexual desirability.
There are three well-worn story arcs for the fate of the bad girl: she provides gleeful schadenfreude by getting her comeuppance and going down in flames; she redeems herself by acquiescing, grovelling and being accepted into the society or group she rejected and accepts a new, subservient role; or she ages out of her sex appeal, providing a different kind of defeat an audience can enjoy.
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In part, my early work reflected, critiqued and predicted both societal views of women and women’s behaviour. Painted in opaque block colours of high gloss enamel that creates a shiny veneer, the image partially reflects the viewer. My Big Pin-Up series is about the influence of porn aesthetic on mainstream fashion and beauty standards – and the recent myth that exposing and objectifying oneself is empowering.
After my hospital years, I decided to stop making art that reflects or critiques society and focus instead on what I want to put into the world.
I still like beautiful things and sexy feelings. I see sex and violence as dynamic aspects of the bigger themes of life and death. All these facets are part of my new work. But in ways that don’t perpetuate what I used to critique.
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This year has been the soft launch of my intentionally measured comeback. I understand the quickest way to gain attention would be to play the bad girl trope with a dash of victim: make fast, easily consumable art; post thirst traps and hot takes; tattle private details of famous collectors to tabloid magazines; and tell the story of my dramatic hiatus while crying to camera.
It’s a well-worn strategy: an attention-seeking phase followed by an attempt to parlay the attention into financial stability. While it bumps up social media metrics and increases product placement rates, it’s not art.
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Perhaps the most courageous sin for a woman artist who can generate swift, cheap-trick attention is to refuse and, instead, simply prove herself through the quality of her work. Without denying her sexuality, female gaze or desires but instead creating context for them within an oeuvre.
It’s a slower, lonelier, more complex and more demanding path. It makes her an outsider. But it’s a better fate than the bad girl.