Inside Outside
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Inside Outside
Conceptually inspired by Artemisia Gentileschi’s 1620 rape trials, this project explores the injustice of the judicial system and the permanent psychological effects of rape. Particularly focusing on the loss of control for the victim and the perpetrator’s need for dominance. The name Inside Outside refers to the relationship between the internal and external, whilst alluding to eating disorders - a common coping mechanism for victims of rape.
In response to Doris Salcedos representation of trauma through objects, I subject materials to trauma through destructive or altering processes such as burning, firing and smashing, whilst using materials such as animal meat and scrap metal to symbolise the dehumanisation inflicted with sexual violence.
Exploring the notion that rape is about control, not sex, the stop motion sculptures explore control and loss of control. I empower the materials and remove that power when they go into the kiln. After the trauma of firing they are completely changed and hardened, a shell of their former self.
I came across the fox in a field and continued to document its decay. It took only a week for the majority of the fox to disappear; in contrast, it took months for the meat I attached to the tree to disappear. I had interfered with the process of decay, thus elongating its demise.
Both the fox and the lamb ribs feature frequently in the film Inside Outside, the final outcome of this project. The film explores the stages of rape and processing trauma, through non-human representation. Primarily this signifies the dehumanisation resulting from sexual violence, whilst creating a space in which violent acts can be shown symbolically rather than realistically.
Influenced by Peter Greenaway’s show of decomposition and idea of ‘the human zoo’ in A Zed and Two Noughts, and by the use of contradictory sound in Kubrick's A Clockwork Orange, I incorporate sound, shot footage and animation.