Nameless (The Stone Carrier)

Performance

2014

I am playing here with two concepts: heroic versus sexualised female body. Women are represented as weaker sex in most of the cultures. Yet there are female giants in Northern mythology. Mythical female giants and heroines have often carried stones in the apron. The apron snaps in various reasons and the stone falls down. Typical female reaction is then to burst out crying. Female giants are told to have cried so much tears that lakes and swamps appear. Male giants in the same situation simply swear, spit and walk away. In this video I decided to offer a new solution. A woman doesn’t always have to be a passive and helpless victim of circumstances who waits for a man to save her. Woman can show her biceps as a token of her power and independence. At the moment she raises hands to show biceps, the apron opens and we can see Michelangelo David’s nude. It raises many questions: is it possible for a woman to be a hero? Demonstrating biceps is a masculine act. How common is for women to show their muscles? If a woman grows muscles, it doesn’t mean she wants to be a man. There is an error: woman who wants to be a strong, fit heroine doesn’t fit in typical female role. Feminist thinker Garland-Thomson’s (2011) offered a term misfit. Misfit means that something doesn’t feel quite right, is uncomfortable, uncanny, odd. Heroine misfits into woman’s role, but can be at the same time physically fit. She is queer, originally meaning strange or peculiar. I am trying to find a way how women could be heroic without being odd and oversexualized.

 

 

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