Making of "Vanitas: Flesh Dress for an Albino Anorectic", Jana Sterbak

More on http://www.light-house-films.com : Making of "Vanitas: Flesh Dress for an Albino Anorectic" by Jana Sterbak for the exhibition "Tous Cannibales" at la Maison Rouge, Paris

Vanitas is a term originally used to describe 17th-century Dutch still-life compositions of rotting meat and game, guttering candles, and skulls. These paintings were intended as meditations on the fleeting nature of life, the inevitability of death, and the necessity for a spiritual life. By calling this work Vanitas, Sterbak points the viewer toward ideas that animate her work: the alienation humans feel from their own flesh, aging, and mortality. Here, the natural aging process takes place before our eyes as the meat passes from a raw to cured state.

The work also addresses issues concerning women, fashion, consumption, and the body. The equation of women with meat and the notion that "you are what you wear" are common ideas in Western society. In the United States, statistics have pointed to a growing number of young women with eating disorders such as bulimia and anorexia nervosa (referred to in the title), because their body types do not match the prevailing fashion or "look" sported by the tall, thin models populating the media.

The dress was stitched together from 60 pounds of raw flank steak and must be constructed anew each time it is shown. Following a centuries-old method of food preservation, the meat is heavily salted and allowed to air-dry. Over the span of the exhibition, the aging process drastically changes the appearance of the work.

Tous Cannibales
February 12 - May 15, 2011
La Maison Rouge, Paris
More information: http://www.lamaisonrouge.org

Category:

Education

Tags:

• meat dress
• jana sterbak
• maison rouge
• feminism
• tous cannibales
• cannibalism
• arts

[TheWizter]

Disgusting but cool :O

[PB1689]

Quelle HONTE !!! Je ne suis pas un partisan de la bienpensance ou du politiquement correct mais coudre des sacs entiers de viande (en en gaspillant la moitié au passage) pour créer une ROBE ???!!! Tandis que même dans notre propre pays manger de la viande est devenu un luxe pour beaucoup (et je ne parle même pas des pays du 1/3 monde etc)... Quel gâchis stupide, ça me révolte et me dégoûte...