Fashionista: Bite Me

A few months back Handbag and I traversed a few towns in the south west and made note of some interesting discoveries: Celebrity culture is alive and well in our tidy little regional towns.

At the Rink in Bunbury, we managed to snare and snap the gorgeously stylish Ree Ree and Indi making a hasty exit from the zone-de-skate. We were so greatful she obediently elected not to wear her skates in the carpark...

Delighted as we were by this, we were equally impressed by the spirit of the Balingup Girls in Bridgetown; with Handbag in tow they cut a strinking scene going about their daily business whilst awaiting the Saturday afternoon fantastic gymnastic exodus from the local recreation centre where our little darlings were flinging themselves about in rubbery ways we can only dream about doing nowdays (as our husbands no doubt dream also) as the limbs barely remember such distant leaping recollections from our spritely youth.

On we traveled, my handbag and I to accost more innocent Balingup girls only to plunge them into the Handbag Dreaming series where we all suddenly become superhuman celebrity types who gorgeously dash about importantly from one appointment to the next...or from the General Store to the Bronze Gallery for coffee...

Handbag & Helie

I am fortunate to have understanding friends who are prepared to put their reputations and egos on the line in the name of art.

We took a roadtrip to Pemberton recently with Helie in tow to see the Helen Grey-Smith show. On the way home we call into Manjimup and took advantage of the scenery.

Helie shows us all how life can be lived to the fullest, with great style and enthusiasm.

Handbag becomes a ritual talisman equivalent to a mask in theatre: in masking our breasts with those of the beast we cannot help but respond in kind. This sort of street theatre-sports cannot be underestimated in it's ability to bring out the beast within.

Interestingly enough, touted as a handbag - the ultimate fashion fetish - she becomes an obliging wife or maid, ever responsive to the needs of her man in keeping him well-serviced and maintained in true silver screen goddess style.

Remember ladies in the 'missus' category: Our men need us. Bettina Arndt says we should 'just do it' and roll over like a good dog who will feel the heat rise mid-coitus. What do you think?

Handbag Evolution

Image: Protoype 1

The Handbag concept evolved as a response to an emotional outpouring; a ‘spill your guts’ moment followed sharply by deep regret and remorse akin to the embarrassment of a stumble and spill in a public space.

In the midst of my shattered ego-mourning shame I began to consider ideas of contents, containment, emotion and a certain propriety governing my gender as a handbag bulging with undisclosed truths hidden from the public sphere of judgement then suddenly and unceremoniously dumped in full view.

I had always had an issue ‘containing’ myself within the required space of acceptance yet ironically fought with myself to be ‘contained’,  to be a good girl: Aren’t we supposed to live in a post-feminist era where these things don’t matter/have been resolved?

The Handbag as object and performance tool had the potential for me to speak of these spaces and this conflict.

I wanted to create a handbag that would discomfort slightly by shifting and manipulating norms regarding the female form, fashion and functionality. I wanted to use this object as performance piece, symbolically re-enacting my ‘spill your guts’ moment over and again by spilling the contents of the bag in various public spaces to see what response I would get, if any.

Image: Layered Handbag Patterns

My desire was to challenge the idea of containment, the feminine façade of smiling sweetly with a wave of the hand in demurring sweet virtues of ‘oh it’s nothing’ over the war raging within: spilling my contents would become an act of defiance and strength rather than an admission of weakness and vulnerability.

The handbag would have the capacity to attract and repel in its state of beautiful ugliness revealing the contradictions inherent in ‘woman’ by drawing out people’s personal, societal and generational values and beliefs in response to it.

Crafting

Image: Handbag Draft Pattern 1 (above)

In designing and creating the bag I considered a variety of materials but the form stayed consistent:  in the shape of two large pendulous breasts.

I designed several different bags from calico, old tea-towels, faux fur, lingerie and lace before deciding that animal skin would be the most impacting and powerful material to use as it resonated with my intention to speak of the hidden layers of woman.

            Image:  Handbag Trial (Empty Socks, below)

Fur and leather spoke of her basest form; her animal instinct, her hairy flesh, her form as function, her skin of the beast that is desperately clipped, snipped, burnt, waxed, sliced, trimmed, injected and manipulated to hide. And hide she does: deep within the beast lurks like a ghostly apparition of our pre-‘civilized’ past.

Image: Recycled Fur Handbag with Pocket

The process began to take over as the crafting of the bag became the point of focus as ‘origin of the species’ commenting upon the continuous and cyclic nature of the fashioning of the female form and identity. I have amassed various patterns, bags and process documents that detailed the crafting process that became of interest in and of themselves as spokes on the wheel of the process cycle.

In revealing the construction of a handbag that replicates the female form as beastly I hope to draw out some of the hidden values and assumptions lurking below the Skin of the Beast that quietly insist upon appropriate feminine behaviour and appearance. 

Image: Pattern Trial in Calico

On and on and on it goes

Helen Grey-Smith



Pemberton, September 5 – 25 2009


I found Helen Grey-Smith’s retrospective in Pemberton inspiring and enlightening. Her works amassed the sort of insight and energy that generates a cascading sense of wonder and deep reflection while her artist-narrative and context left me with a deep burning sensation in my chest. I am quite sure there is a pointed effort made by most writers about Helen's work not to mention the elephant in the gallery (her husband) out of respect and admiration for her and her work.  However, as a feminist, I cannot help but be desperately intrigued by her life circumstance to ponder the influences in her art in order to tease out her artistic ambition aside from the context within which it was created.


Formally trained in London in the late 30’s and mid 50’s Helen’s work is represented in state and national galleries as well as numerous significant collections. It is no small wonder then, why it has fallen to a small art collective in regional Western Australia to draw together a series of her works as a means to confirm her reputation and status in the Western Australian art narrative. The little town of Pemberton, it seems, is in keeping with international art trends of a newly evolved feminist revivial. Lets hope the rest of WA catches on before it's a decade past us again!


She was quite happy to create in her own space and time without great ambition or desire for her work. Interesting. This is where I wonder, how much were attitudes to women artists - artists who were also mothers - responsibile for her choosing to languish in the shadow of her husband? It is artists like Helen, working with the feminine (read less valued) media of paper collage, fabric and print to paint subject matter that has no political or lofty ambition other than to please, to exist, to cause no trouble, to be attractive - that highlight for us the 'moral' (read guilt) restrictions placed upon women artists-mothers until only recently. Only her work to me is so much more than Helen had planned. Her work exists within a context, that context is characterised by conservativism and commercialism rather than ideas, debate and discussion. Did Helen have a choice to paint anything other than? How do we determine self-will or autonomy aside from the machinations of society and culture?


Born in 1916, Helen Grey-Smith is sadly more often regarded as the wife of Guy Grey-Smith than a talented artist in her own right despite the fact that she was the one to introduce and nurture GGS's artistic sensibility.  Mark Grey-Smith told me she sent him art supplies and books when he was prisoner of war which fostered his creative spirit. Fortuitous perhaps, as GGS is considered a demi-god looming large on the Western Australian art scene.


Helen's story as the other half lingering in the shadows of one of Western Australia’s canonical heroes of the art scene is repeated for many ‘lesser’ female artists the world over, viewed as supporting muse or mimic of ‘the great master’ they attended to (The guerrilla girls bedside companion to the History of Western Art is a good place to start on this). We need more female artist from regional WA success stories to inspire and encourage our next generation of artists. GGS, Brian McKay et al struggled along with the dinosaurs to bring modernsim to Australia. Unfortunately, modernism is now a bit like patterson's curse - it is thriving so much now it threatens to strangle and kill off any other fragile growth.

Frozen @ 4am

Couldn't sleep for thinking. Nothing of great substance, just that feeling of fingers in too many pies. Solution? Start another blog, set up a website, get busier...

Spent the whole day in the studio for the first time in ages, it was wonderful. I cut up one of the paintings I exhibited in the South West Survey (BRAG) and sewed it into a handbag. Probably some of the neatest sewing I've done in a while. Must be the oil-painted canvas.

BFF 2009 (BEFORE)

BFF (2009) AFTER

There is something wonderful about defacing then destroying something that was so laboriously created as a precious object.  Put it out, pull it back, carve it into something else. The process takes over.

Just got growled at for having the music too loud, time to sign off and hit some zzzzzz.