Joan Semmel is an American artist who is most known for her large scale, lifelike nudes of women's bodies as seen from the perspective of looking down at it and paintings of couples engaging intimately. Her work addresses female body issues especially centering around issues of aging, identity, and image, explores female sexuality, and examines the historically subservient role of women.
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Sunlight 1978 (https://thejewishmuseum.org/collection/33169-sunlight)
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During the rise of the feminist movement in the 1970s, Semmel painted honest, realistic nudes, typically using her own body for inspiration. In this time, the male gaze on the female body was a heavily discussed topic so Semmel used her work to literally shift the view.
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Woman Under Sheet 1974 (http://clara.nmwa.org/index.php?g=entity_detail_print&entity_id=7305)
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"Instead of working from sketches, Semmel chose to take photographs of herself, looking down on her body, an approach that extremely foreshortened the figure. By using these photographs to create her paintings, Semmel shows her body as she would experience it, not as an idealized nude"
(http://clara.nmwa.org/).
The Locker Room series is my favorite. Here is investigates the aging process and I know numerous women who spent hundreds on products that will make them look younger. The beauty industry is a multibillion dollar industry after all. This series portrays middle aged women and their bodies.
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| Steam Room 1988 (http://www.joansemmel.com/) |
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