I am interested in exploring the work and theory of contemporary performance artist and author Joanna Frueh, as a way of examining how "third-wave" feminism allows for greater complexity in the handling of subjects such as eroticism, pleasure, beauty/ugliness, and compassionate embodiment in the female experience. It is my sense (from within my very basic understanding of the history of feminism) that, at its inception, feminism characterized the female body in more blatant, hyperbolic terms: the victimized body, the aggressively sexual(ized) body, etc. Joanna Frueh, however, proposes - to an almost comically 'new-age-y' degree - a gentler, less militant, more complicated model for female embodiment and empowerment. She conveys these ideas through books and articles, as well as through her text-based performance works.
While Frueh is clearly over 45 years of age, and thus came of age artistically in a pre-third-wave climate, she continues to perform, publish, and teach actively today, and her work continues to attract the consideration of contemporary critics and theorists. As I do more research on Frueh, the criticism surrounding her work, and "third-wave" feminism as a whole (*is* it a 'whole'? - that is a complicated question - also something I intend to develop a better understanding of...), I will post more specifics about how Frueh's work embodies significant questions/issues in third-wave feminism, or in whatever you want to call today's climate of feminist issues and concerns.
Link to Frueh's site: www.joannafrueh.com
Posted by Adrienne Lynch
1 comment:
It is nice to see an artist who reclaims "sweet" and "girly" poses and colors to use in the name of feminism.
Is her work mostly performance stuff? I can't seem to find any reproductions of it on her website. Are the scripts just not running right on my computer? Or where can we see clips?
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