The Hidden Pin Up #24 - Debut at The Whitworth Art Gallery

Sister

You've been on my mind
Sister, we're two of a kind
So sister
I'm keepin' my eyes on you
I betcha think
I don't know nothin'
But singin' the blues
Oh sister, have I got news for you
I'm somethin'
I hope you think
That you're somethin' too
 

On 22nd September The Hidden Pin Up made its debut at The Whitworth Art Galley. This was a day myself and fellow collaborator Darren Pritchard of the House of Ghetto (HOG) had been aiming towards for a long time and it was so worth the wait!

Working with HOG dancer Lenai Russell and singer Justina Aina, our two superb performers, we'd chosen a staircase in the gallery that not only worked as a great theatrical stage but also led the way up to the Bodies Of Colour wallpaper exhibition, which tackles the racial stereotypes and representations found in design through history, and tied in so perfectly with the themes of The Hidden Pin Up.

Arriving early on the day so that we could set up I felt excited to see people already turning up for the first of the day's hourly performances.

As the first notes of Miss Celie's Blues flooded the huge open space, everyone's eyes were led to the sultry movements of Lenai on the upper floor, hidden behind the hemp fans and wearing the hemp showgirl costume I'd created. As the song took hold she told it's story of female solidarity against oppression effortlessly, making her way down the stairs while dancing with the fans, which was no mean feat. I was so impressed with how graceful and focused she was and also noticed, after seeing the rehearsals, how the presence of the audience elevated her performance further.

Once the song had ended, the second half of the performance kicked in with a house beat and almost immediately Justina's powerful vocals layered over Lenai's vogue driven assent back up the stairs. The effect was exactly what we'd hoped for with the sensuous movements that invited the eye contrasting so vividly with Justina's provocative singing/ spoken word performance, sometimes humourous sometimes accusative, using the words of stories I'd collected from women of colour and stitched onto the fans. Justina was just brilliant and took the whole piece into a new dynamic.

The piece ended with both performers reaching the upper floor and disappearing from view as the music faded out. Loads of people turned up for each performance and the applause was really gratifying as was the huge amount of feedback.

 Many people said they wanted to see more, or would be happy to watch an extended piece and I personally wasn't expecting how moved many individuals were. Various people said the piece touched them deeply and they found the work powerful. This really fuels me and makes me feel that all the research and setting up was worth it!

Accompanying the performance piece I also ran two workshops that tied in with the Bodies Of Colour exhibition and the overall theme of racial stereotypes and misrepresentation that set the day. The workshops were a chance for participants to create their own political wallpaper designs inspired by the exhibition and The Hidden Pin Up. The results were impressive and there was lots of lively chat about the topic.

In all, the day was really successful and I'm so happy that the work spoke for itself and made such an impact. One woman told me she had traveled from Glasgow to see it! It was lovely to speak to people about the work, let them get close to the fans and to share ideas and thoughts between performances.

Thanks to everyone who came on the day, and for those who couldn't make it, we had the performance filmed professionally and will be sharing it in time. Also myself and Darren are hoping to take this work further, evolve it and show it again in the future, so definitely watch this space! The Hidden Pin Up will return...

The Hidden Pin Up #23 - THIS SATURDAY!

 

This Saturday 22nd September sees the debut performance of Hidden Pin Up at The Whitworth Art Gallery in Manchester! Myself and fellow collaborators the House of Ghetto are so excited to get this work up and running! The day will consist of performances every hour on the hour 11am - 3pm and these will be interspersed with two workshops that tie in with the gallery's wallpaper exhibition Bodies of Colour. 

The Hidden Pin Up looks at the fetishization of the black female body by investigating the hidden history of the black pin up girl and the legacy of racial stereotypes still found in modern day life. Taking inspiration from the traditional burlesque fan dance with a House of Ghetto twist, this site specific dance and spoken word vignette is political with some added phunk.

The Repeating Patterns workshops are a chance to create a collage wallpaper design and put your own spin on ideas of racial and cultural stereotypes using design tropes found within the Bodies of Colour exhibition.

Times run as follows:

Saturday 22 September, 11am - 3.10pm

All events are free, drop in, no need to book

Performance times:

11am – 11.10am
12pm – 12.10pm
1pm – 1.10pm
2pm – 2.10pm
3pm – 3.10pm

Workshop times:

11.15am – 12pm
1.15pm – 2pm

Hope you can make it!

Keep up to date with the project's progress on this blog and by following me on Instagram @gemma_parker_artist

Northern Art Carbooty 2018 - First In The Fight!

This Bank Holiday weekend saw Northern Art Carbooty taking place on a very wet and soggy Sunday at Sadler's Yard and PLANT NOMA in Manchester. Yet, despite the weather we had a great turn out of people coming down to enjoy the live art, stalls, workshops and artisan food. 

I was there with The Tattooed Lady, tattoo dispenser machine, to distribute my Manchester Suffragette temporary tattoos as part of a new commission to celebrate the centenary of women gaining the vote in the UK (as a side note: I've had several men over the course of this project who felt the need to point out it wasn't just women but working class men gaining the vote too, and, yes, I know, that was great in its own right! But for women this was a MASSIVE landmark that gave [some] females the right to vote for the FIRST TIME EVER! I really don't understand why this achievement should be somehow 'put in it's place').

Dressed as a Manchester Suffragette, I manned the machine and helped apply the tattoos to people attending the event. I met loads of interesting characters from Manchester and beyond, some who knew about Manchester's involvement in the Suffrage movement and some who had no idea. I met two ladies from Switzerland who told me the centenary for them wont be until 2071! The whole day made me feel really proud to be a Mancunian and champion what the original Suffragettes stood for. They truly were 'first in the fight' and thanks to their effort and sacrifices Manchester played a key role in women's history and helped to change the world. It was amazing to see so many people show their support by wearing a tattoo!

(These guys from America were some of the first to receive tattoos and loved them!)

There was a great atmosphere throughout the day and I was joined by some of Manchester's best creatives. Taking a stroll around the venue on my break I met some faces I'd not seen for years! It was good to catch up and also see some of the gorgeous unique wares made by local artists

 Manchester illustrator Stan Chow and his iconic women prints

Eva Elliot of Margo Ceramics and her delicate jewellery 

Also I want to mention the brilliant art of Cammy Smithwick, who I forgot to take a photo of, but whose work I have loved for a while now. It was fab to see some of her handmade trinkets that make me think of booty from a wacky Victorian explorers backpack: unique, exotic and full of stories waiting to be imagined.

Fellow commissioned artist Nicola Smith performed her piece 'Monument' as an ode to modern women and the lack of statuary honouring women from history around the UK. This piece was performed/danced against a range of different songs about female empowerment, funny and on the nose, it really left an impression.

You can see more images and see if you were one of the people wearing a tattoo on my Tattooed Lady Facebook page HERE and also more about the day on Carbooty's photos HERE. A big thank you to Liz and Charlie for organising the entire event and asking me to be part of it and special thanks to Samira who volunteered her time to help me apply tattoos.
 

Northern Art Carbooty is coming! Get your Suffragette Tattoos!

Not long now until Northern Art Carbooty comes to Manchester! I'll be there with The Tattooed Lady and a specially commissioned work to celebrate 100 years since women got the vote in the UK. I've been preparing my outfit for the day as I'll be appearing as a Manchester Suffragette to help rally YOU folk join in for the cause and get your very own temporary tattoo.

I have to say I'm really pleased with how these beauties turned out (see my last post to find out how I designed these tattoos). I wore mine for three days before if showed any hint of budging. Come along and enjoy a day of art events, stalls, food, workshops and more! Hope to see you there!

Northern Art Carbooty 2018 - The Tattooed Lady Returns!

The Tattooed Lady is an end of the pier 1900's style temporary tattoo dispenser I created three years ago for the launch exhibition at HOME in Manchester. She is an interactive art work with flashing bulbs and a friendly 'ding!' that offers audiences the chance to take a piece of art home with them, either as a keepsake for posterity or as some temporary 'ink' to wear proudly on their skin.

I am now bringing The Tattooed Lady to the Northern Art Carbooty next month for a new commissioned piece. August 26th will see me and the Lady at Saddlers Yard and PLANT NOMA in Manchester:

'The event is an extravaganza of art, craft, live performance, workshop activity, food and music. Northern Art Carbooty works with artists and designers to encourage new artistic collaborations with the communities located around the event'

For this new work I am concentrating on 100 years since women got the right to vote in the UK and I have been designing a special tattoo to celebrate not only this landmark event but also Manchester's crucial role as the place where women's suffrage was born! I love my city not least because it has a rich history of being bloody minded and bolshy but it has led many a revolution influencing social and political change.

I began by looking at famous Manchester figures such as Emmeline Pankhurst, Annie Kenney and Hannah Mitchell, all fantastic people in their own right. However I found the photos of little known Manchester suffragettes marching and being arrested really moving and inspiring. They brought home the fact that these women risked so much not just for themselves but for the sake of every woman since.

For that reason, rather than concentrating on one person I decided to design a Mancunian 'everywoman'. My suffragette was very inspired by these two photos; the first being two local women wearing news sheets as aprons...

Mabel Capper (left), who by 1913 had been to prison four times in the cause of obtaining the vote for women, and Patricia Woodlock (right) advertising a meeting to be held in Heaton Park, Manchester, Lancashire, 19th July 1908

...and this fantastic Manchester banner once lost in time but now proudly on display at the People's History Museum in Manchester. I think the words on this banner are so powerful and say so much about the city and it's people,

For the tattoo design I wanted to incorporate mills and factories in the image not only to emphasise Manchester's connection to Suffrage but also the fact that many women who became involved in the Manchester movement came from a working class background. With the city booming in the 1900's thanks to the cotton industry, factory work was a mainstay for many of it's growing population.

This was my first design and I looked to Lynda Carter's Wonder Woman for the stance. I always thought Lynda looked strong and assertive when she stood like this with her hands on hips. (Interestingly, Wonder Woman's origins come from a Suffrage background as the creator was a firm supporter of women's Suffrage and his mistress's aunt was Margaret Sanger, an advocate for birth control and a women's rights activist). 

The tattoos are to be just 2" x 2" to fit The Tattooed Lady and I decided once shrinking this design down that it was packing too much into such a small space. Plus I wanted to push the Manchester connection even more within the image so it would be more obvious. I tried playing about with scale and placement but I still thought the whole thing wasn't immediate or 'tattooey' enough (I do like the original image though so I may use it for something else in the future).

In the end I decided to focus mainly on the suffragette's head and shoulders and create a tighter pulled in design. I added a banner for the words 'First in the Fight' and also the Manchester Bee which reflects the city's history and continuing unity in the face of adversity.

The suffragette stands in front of the chimneys (a bit phallic I realised, but they do reflect the male dominance of the era) wearing her hat with its green white and purple ribbon symbolising the movement; purple for loyalty and dignity, white for purity, and green for hope. The white roses stand for the white that suffragettes wore on their protests and also more recently recalls the white roses worn by celebrities on the red carpet to support the #timesup and #metoo movements.

I felt that this image worked better overall and will have more impact when applied to the skin. With the design now sent off for printing I'm looking forward to getting the finished temporary tattoos in my hands and trying them out! You can get your own at Northern Art Carbooty on 26th August! You'll find me there with The Tattooed Lady appearing as a Manchester suffragette myself! More on that to follow, stay tuned!...

The Hidden Pin Up #22 - Bodies of Colour

There's been a lot going on between this blog post and the last as The Hidden Pin Up now has a date and venue for it's debut performance! Put Saturday 22nd September in your diaries!

We have been in talks with the Whitworth Art Gallery in Manchester and are currently working on the order of a day which will include hourly performances with wrap around activities which we are still formulating. So far we are thinking about debates, possible workshops, leaving a legacy and asking other artists to respond to the work.

The Whitworth is housing a new exhibition called Bodies of Colour which ties in perfectly with the themes and ideas which The Hidden Pin Up addresses and will be a great focal point to perform the piece in. With the tag line 'Breaking with stereotypes in the wallpaper collection', the exhibition deals with difficult questions and complex histories surrounding cultural identities and systemic racism as described in the words and images found in the decorative wallpapers on display. 

Some of the pieces date back to the 1800's such as a wallpaper picturing scenes from Uncle Tom's Cabin produced in Manchester in support of the anti slavery movement, Uncle Tom being a stereotypical shorthand for subservience.

Even the most innocent subject carried deeper meaning such as the 1933 Mickey Mouse wallpaper, which was manufactured around the time Mickey Mouse was 'blacking up' in a cartoon version of Uncle Tom. It interested me to note the visual formula for Mickey and his early pals copied the tropes used by black and white minstrels with their white gloves and highlighted mouths.

Other recent pieces produced by artists tackle the exhibition's theme with a jarring blend of both decorative and disturbing such as Robert Gober's 1989 work, Hanging Man/ Sleeping Man. The repeating pattern tells us much of racism in America while the sleeping white man is blissful in his (chosen) ignorance to it.

Wandering around the exhibition I was really impressed with how well it put across the fact that we live with these messages as repetitive backdrops to our lives in much the same way the micro aggressions aimed at women of colour form the work behind The Hidden Pin Up, 

The decorative aspect of the wallpaper somehow manages to make the negative ideology much more acceptable, it almost hides it! Similarly many mirco aggressions are framed in a complementary or repetative way that allow them to go unnoticed by some.

I am so excited to work closely with the exhibition and allow The Hidden Pin Up to add extra context and discussion to the project. Much more to follow as we set our plans in motion . I'll be posting about them as things take shape!

The Hidden Pin Up #21 - Choreography part 2

In mid May we had scheduled a trial performance of The Hidden Pin Up at a venue in Manchester, which for reasons beyond our control had to be cancelled. It was a bit of a blow but rehearsing in situ and developing the performance to a near finished version gave everyone a chance to see our collective ideas weave together.

Lenai, our fantastic dancer from Manchester's House Of Ghetto (HOG), did sterling work picking up where we'd left off from our first choreography session a few weeks back. For the trial performance we wanted to use a staircase as the stage area as this was to be an intervention, treating the audience to an unexpected experience from their viewpoint gathered at the stairs base.

Using our chosen song of Miss Celie's Blues for the first half it took Lenai no time to adjust to the diagonal ground of the stairs while using the hessian fans to recreate a traditional fan dance. The results were stunning as the stairs lent an air of magic to the piece, literally letting Lenai appear far above our heads with natural light shining behind her and through the fans. As she made her way down the steps instinctively matching her moves to the words and breaks in the song, both myself and HOG choreographer Darren Pritchard, knew that this was going to be a very strong piece.

 

 Once Lenai was on a level with the audience our idea to flip the script and introduce a modern Vogue beat for the second half of the performance took shape. This was especially exciting for me as I was intrigued to see how the very different moves of Vogue dancing would fit the piece and I was not disappointed. As a professional dancer with a strong Vogue background Lenai added a sophisticated sensuality that matched the fluid movements of the burlesque section to perfection.

Our plan was to have live vocals performed by Justina Aina the fab singer who we recently worked with to create our own Vogue track for the piece. Her confrontational use of the words I have stitched into the fans would have juxtaposed brilliantly with Lenai's graceful ascent back up the stairs, eventually to disappear like a dream that once was. Unfortunately we never got to try this out but from the groundwork already done, both Darren and I know this would be a powerful blend that would leave a lasting impression on the audience. As we progress on this project there will be much more to come so watch this space!

Everything I See I Swallow

I've just seen a woman tied up and suspended from the ceiling. Her pale naked body contrasted with the red ropes that criss-crossed her skin as her flesh swelled slightly around the cords. Her entire shape was transformed as the ropes cut off her ability to move and forced her into an unnatural position. As she swung round and round, she was no longer like you and I, she looked helpless and immobile, bound fast, but she was far from powerless, she was completely in control.

I've just left the theatre from a showing of Everything I See I Swallow, a commissioned production taking place at The Lowry as part of their Week 53 celebrations. My mind is humming with thoughts of the things I've seen and heard.

Using a mixture of aerial skills and Japanese rope bondage known as Shibari (or Kinbaku) Everything I See I Swallow explored the complex and difficult relationship between long standing feminist ideologies and modern feminist viewpoints as portrayed by the play's characters, a young woman called Olivia who has found empowerment through submission and her mother, a woman who has tried to bring her daughter up to own of her own body, and steer away from damaging female stereotypes.

When the mother finds out that that her treasured peach of a daughter is posting naked images of herself in rope bondage on Instagram she is horrified and dismayed. In an attempt to protect her precious offspring she hammers home the feminist theories she herself has been educated on and the words of feminists past tumble from her in desperation, words we know she has read and memorised from the piles of feminist literature heaped round the stage.

Is Olivia doing this just to get online followers? Does she realise how harmful these type of pictures are? Or what a bad message they send out to other young women? Has her mother taught her nothing?

For the daughter the experience of being tied up is anything but exploitative. The beginning of the play starts with her hanging chrysalis like bound in her ropes, and like a butterfly, she hatches from their bonds a new person. As she carefully removed each knot, untying them herself and stepping to the ground she explained her journey to freedom.

For Olivia it was the pressure of living up to an acceptable version of femininity placed on her by society that truly confined her. It was good to be pretty, but bad to be pleased about it. It was expected that she should be flattered that men found her attractive, but bad to act on her own sexual desires. In time she felt ashamed by her own sexuality, hiding her body away. Yet, having the realisation that what really turned her on was submission was a turning point for her. A chance to actively play out the role of passive female through choice.

Choice is the really important message Olivia is trying to convey. No-one is forcing her to submit, it's a completely free decision and one that she gets pleasure and her own agency from. For her mother its hard to accept that something so intrinsically derogatory can be positive. As Olivia tries to explain her reasons for bondage, the mother is conflicted by her need to protect and nurture her daughter and get on board with such an alien idea.

To some degree this is an argument I've heard many times before. Topics like burlesque, Grid Girls, even make up and high heels have been compared to constraints invented by men for the pleasure of the male gaze; for every woman who feels legitimised by these sensual and sexual tropes another feels belittled and stagnated by them. It's never a simple issue of who is right or wrong but a tangled web of time and place, personal experience and choice.

For me, the play spoke eloquently about these precarious arguments in a focused and engaging way. It was easy to like both characters and understand where their very opposing views came from. The daughter's inner monologue describing her daily struggle to find her place in a male dominated world where she felt both comfortable and respected touched on unspoken emotions I, and I suspect many women, have often felt. Modern living for the younger woman really can be an ongoing journey of awareness and analysis, measuring your worth against a man made scale of what is acceptable and realising you can go against the norm. However finding the strength and understanding to do this isn't always easy.

The daughter character found that being tied up through choice and enjoying it subverted the struggle. It turned the power play on its head. Essentially she found full ownership of her body both physically and mentally by fully living in a moment where she was 100% compliant and enjoying herself. This was beautifully illustrated by a segment of the play where sensual music thrummed, the lights glowed red and through a crimson haze we saw Olivia look directly at the audience with a suggestive grin. She moved with fluid motion across the stage wearing diamante and little else. Finding the coils of red rope she expertly began to tie specific knots winding them over and around her torso, between her breasts and down her back. Within no time she was transformed into the living work of erotic art swaying gently above the floor suspended by her bondage.

Then her mother entered. The music stopped abruptly, the lights turned white and her mum's disapproval stole the moment of all it's magic. Olivia was instantly unsure and awkward and clawed at the ropes to remove them. 

The mother character, like many feminists who grew up during the 60's 70's and 80's had first hand knowledge of what it was like to be sidelined and marginalised to a much greater degree than the young women of today. It is because of the older generations relentless fight for equality that young women like her daughter have been able to find their own voices and make such unlikely life choices while they are still young. The disconnect occurs when these choices seem to go against the older generation's moral compass. What this play reinforced for me was that the fight was for nothing if the old school don't support the freedom of choice even if it may seem to take on a patriarchal leaning. Choice is a huge step towards the ideal of equality. Understanding, conversation and support are key to moving forward.

Everything I See I Swallow was a beautiful and moving production that often left me in awe at the incredible aerial work which was used to describe memories and emotions. Both actresses, Maisy Taylor and Tamsin Shasha were fantastic at climbing high above the audience and creating elegant effortless shapes that defied gravity. The ropes they climbed could be both a device to bind them or give them opportunity to fly, depending on their state of mind. 

This was a thoroughly insightful look into the psychological, sexual and emotional journey of feminism within the modern world, an ongoing journey that is taking new and unexpected turns. It is up to us as a whole to make sure we don't get tangled in all the politics along the way.

The Hidden Pin Up #20 - Taking the Mic!

Friday was a very exciting day where The Hidden Pin Up got taken to the next level via song and spoken word as we spent the morning recording our very own vogue track!

Since we have the first half of the fan dance performance mapped out to a chosen song that evokes the bluesy burlesque of the vintage era (see this past post for details), it was important that the second half was just as strong yet gave our dancer the chance to move and tell her story in a totally different way.

Myself and co collaborator Darren (house mother of the House of Ghetto) decided to go down a vogue route as that is something the House of Ghetto are especially famous for and can be tailored, much like burlesque, to convey whatever message you want. 

With his strong knowledge of dance and music Darren suggested using the words from the feathers on the burlesque fans as direct inspiration to create our own customised track. Cue the arrival of talented performer Justina Aina (check her out, she's great!) who came with us to the Salford's Lowry Theatre to record some samples that will be laid over music.

It was fascinating to see how Justine worked. Having already been given the full set of stories from the fans, she had put them into sections and created a poetical arrangement that could be broken down, repeated, spoken and sang.

With technical manager David Wimpenny on the sound desk (he really knows his stuff and is a technical wizard, thanks so much Dave!) we were able to record several layers including, repeats of lines, whispered paragraphs and free-styled sections.

The next step will be putting everything together and creating the finished track, however we will be having a trial run of the performance including the fan dance and live vocals later this month, more info to follow!

Here's a sample of Justina's freestyling over a track, this wasn't recorded for our final piece but gave everyone an idea of how the live vocals could work. Hearing the stories put together in this context is both uncomfortable and funny. I'm loving how this is turning out and I am looking forward to sharing the finished thing with you!

The Hidden Pin Up - #19 About the fans

 
Now that choreography has begun on The Hidden Pin Up (see last post) I thought I'd do a little overview on the burlesque fans I created as they are in integral part of the work which explores the black Pin Up, a figure lost in time due to prejudice and the racial fetishes that still surround women of colour to this day.

Based on traditional burlesque fans, I decided to use hessian instead of luxurious feathers to replace the usual glamour with something basic and crude. This was to highlight the 'primitive' and 'savage' stereotypes about women of colour that have surfaced throughout the project and also the hessian harks back to collective ideas of plantations, slavery, poverty and the unrefined. 

An added bonus to using hessian to create individual feathers was that the frayed materiel moves and looks like dried grass, which added another layer of meaning to the fans, evoking tribal garments like headdresses and skirts that typified the stereotypical view of the uncultured 'exotic'. You can see how I made the fans HERE

I knew I wanted to decorate the fans in some way and as the project progressed it became ever more apparent to me that women of colour today face the same prejudices and fetishes as their vintage Pin Up counterparts, in fact, today's women of colour are still dealing with a hangover from colonialism and Western privilege that began centuries ago. 

With this in mind I started to collect real life stories of racial fetishes towards contemporary women of colour. Friends and colleagues and women I had never met shared their tales and an uncomfortable pattern of everyday micro aggressions began to emerge. These became the inspiration for the embroidered words on the feathers. 

I used different shades of brown black and tan and I wasn't too bothered about how much the words stood out because micro aggressions aren't always easy to spot. Some are glaringly obvious and others can sit there unnoticed yet still leave a mark.

With the stories in place the fans became a physical barrier between the viewer and the dancer that spoke only of false fantasies, bias and discrimination, not of the true person behind them. They became a literal way to hide the dancer mimicking the project's title, The Hidden Pin Up and highlighting the fact that real black and non white Pin Up's from the vintage era were largely obscured from the mainstream due to these stereotypes.

There are spaces left on the fans which I hope to fill up as the project continues and I'd like to collect new stories at every performance. Perhaps if I get enough I might even stitch onto the dancer's hessian costume too so that eventually she is covered. 

The fans were made to be danced with but also be seen as a stand alone piece that tell the history and ongoing story of the black Pin Up. I'm excited to see how they progress.