The funny thing about exploring sexuality as a young female is realizing that those who love you have been taught to show it in a violently physical and undignifying way. The world wants to tear you apart limb for limb in the most gruesome way, to capture it all on film, and make you watch.
I wanted this painting to feel as if someone is staring right through you, not at you. As if their eyes couldn't see you at all, but rather the pillow case below you that you've slept on since kindergarten. As if they never took the time to ask how long you've had it before wrapping their knuckles around it. Maybe they did, but he just didn't care that much to pay it any mind.
I am not a toy. I'm someone's kid. Someone's first girl child. Someone's first love. Someone's best friend. If you couldn't realize I am a person, stand alone, perhaps you could better see me through my reflections in others.
I am capable of complex thought and opinion and feeling. I am not the toy, I am the child playing with it. I am not the lewd art, I am the artist. I have autonomy and personality, but this act you seem to covet so much reduces me to little more than a whining vegetable. I must not have gotten the memo. Everyone seems to be unaffected by this. Everyone seems so much less sensitive than me.
The performance is tiring and painful. The pretending is just too much, I don't wanna do it anymore.
Mediums: canvas, acrylic polymer