Knitting as a provocation
My work intentionally provokes a range of conflicting responses. For my undergraduate dissertation I researched the different ways that Louise Bourgeois and Christian Boltanski used second hand clothing in their work and the different meanings the clothing brought to their work. Although knitting is not the same as second hand clothing, there are clear links so I decided to revisit my journal article:
Knitting as body/second skin:
‘by using ‘familiar forms and shapes to reference the human body,’ both artists ‘… transgress the rules of normal representation of bodies’ (Arbus, date unknown).
Knitting and blurring of senses:
‘Through semiotics, clothing is regarded as a signifier, something external to the body (Chandler 2013), but clothing can also be seen as an extension of the body, a second skin (Bristow 2011: 48). I will explore ways in which the materiality and multi-sensory nature of clothing blurs the boundaries of visual and tactile experience (Bristow 2011: 45).
’In semiotic terms , clothing is external to the body, a signifier, and can signify many things including wealth, status, attitude and class (Prasarn 2012). However, there is a merging of the senses of touch and sight associated with cloth; ‘The eye…does not simply look. It also feels. Its response is both visual and tactile…’ the senses are ‘…each enfolded in the other’ (Barnett 1999: 185). This means that clothing can also be regarded as an extension of the body, a second skin. I suggest that the materiality and skin-like nature of cloth provides an alternative range of meanings to the use of clothing in art, operating ‘both through the haptic and the scopic simultaneously, the two modes of perception provide differing points of access to the viewer’ (Dormor 2008: 240).
Gender and knitting:
Cloth is widely regarded as a gendered material. Rozsika Parker discusses ‘the privatisation of female embroidery skills and their role in the inculcation of an ideology of femininity as devout, chaste, obedient...’ (in Carson 2000a: 27). She suggests that ‘...fine art was established as a public activity of high status associated with male professionals, while embroidery became a low status craft associated predominantly with women and domestic spaces’ (ibid). The links between embroidery and cloth are clear.
I think that choosing to use clothing, with its associations with craft and the feminine, instead of the more conventional materials of fine art, is another way that the artists subvert traditional representations of the body and produce ‘different sorts of images of...bodies’ (Perry 1999: 29).
Knitting and femininities/Knitting and Context: matter out of place
According to Rozsika Parker, cloth itself is a gendered material; in her book The Subversive Stitch, she analyses the gender divide between ‘high’ art and feminised craft (Parker 2010: 5; Carson 2000a: 27). She proposes that cloth is a signifier of the private, and thus feminine, sphere (Parker 2010: 5).
‘I will also explore the femininities associated with dirt. Mary Douglas, who describes dirt as ‘matter out of place’, observes that the categories of clean and unclean are ‘projected on to the female body’ (in Campkin and Cox 2007: 4; Carson 2000b: 63), while Julia Kristeva asserts that ‘sexual difference is at the heart of the social difference between clean and dirty’ (in Wolkowitz 2007:18). Also, worn clothes produce contamination anxiety, the private made public, which is yet another gender dichotomy (Carson 2000b: 55).’
Challenging expectations:
Her work, however, does highlight the ‘feminine concerns’ of the use of cloth in art and its ‘power to shock and unsettle conventional ideas about the sculptural object’ (Nochlin 2007: 191). Her fabric works, ‘despite their rejection of conventional notions of sculpture...share certain essential properties with conventional sculpture in bronze, clay or marble’ (ibid.). The power of this work, however, lies in the ‘departures from the niceties of the traditional media’ (ibid.). In Bourgeois’ stitched work, the ‘grotesque handiwork’ and the ‘deliberate ferocity of bad sewing’ challenges the gendered expectations of work with cloth (ibid.). In Pink Days and Blue Days (Fig. 1) I suggest that the contrast between the ephemeral baby blue and pink clothing with the bones as hangers also challenges those expectations.
Knitting and the abject:
‘suggest a physical absence, and ultimately death, which prompts an abject response. Kristeva describes ‘the abject’ as ‘the human reaction (horror, vomit) to a threatened breakdown in meaning caused by the loss of the distinction between subject and object or between self and other’ (in Felluga 2011). She goes on to argue that ‘the corpse is the utmost of abjection’ (Kristeva 1982: 13). Abjection also has associated femininities, linked to dirt and disgust.’
Julia Kristeva’s notion of ‘the abject’ is closely linked to the idea of pollution and consequently also has associated femininities. She describes it as a violent natural reflex of horror or disgust, a ‘combination of physical, moral and psychological reactions’ to an ‘external menace’ which also ‘may menace from inside’ (in Felluga 2011; Campkin and Cox 2007: 11, their italics). She claims ‘…nor is the abject ever simply ‘Body’: it is located wherever there is ambivalence, ambiguity, the improper or the unclean, the overflowing of boundaries, fusion and confusion, or whatever disturbs identity, system, order’ (Kristeva 1982: 4).
Hanging and the abject:
Hanging the garments also emphasises the sculpture’s ‘fragility and vulnerability’ (Larratt-Smith 2011). Bourgeois asserts that the hanging thing ‘…is very helpless’ (in Nixon 2005:170) and ‘Hanging and floating are states of ambivalence and doubt’ (in Larratt- Smith 2011). It is clearly significant to her. I think the hanging motif distinguishes ‘very different identities for (her) sculpture…suggesting a kind of displacement’ (Barlow 1996: 9) which also adds to the feeling of abjection.
The abject and border between public and private
Empty, used clothing inevitably has strong connotations with absence and death.
Immersion and the abject:
I suggest that participation also adds to the abjection. The public can walk through the installation and are immersed in it, ‘they are mostly looking down …they are not speaking…they become a part of the work’ (Boltanski in Rosenbaum- Kranson 2010). The harnessing of multiple senses, as discussed earlier, together with the ‘ceaseless, reverberating soundtrack of thousands of human heartbeats’ (Spears 2010) which accompanies the installation, adds to the immersion and amplifies the abjection. ‘And it’s this idea of being inside the work that is important to me.’ (Boltanski in Rosenbaum- Kranson 2010).
The piece evokes universal loss yet also prompts a personalised abject response. ‘Each one is within the piece, reading it how he or she wants to read it. For Jews here, it’s going to make them think about the Holocaust, but for people from Haiti, it’s going to make them think about the earthquake…’ (Boltanski in Rosenbaum-Kranson 2010) For others it will stir up private grief (Spear 2010).
Craft vs fine art:
I will explore the idea that by rejecting traditional fine art media and choosing to use discarded garments, their work questions the orthodoxy of the patriarchal hierarchy of ‘high art’ and challenges notions of embodiment. The materiality and multiple gender dichotomies associated with used clothing communicate complex meanings through their work. That clothing is an unconventional medium in fine art also adds to the meaning it conveys. Traditionally, hard, durable materials like stone, marble and bronze have been used for sculpture; the soft, impermanent nature of clothing, however, evokes the human form and its mortality, revealing alternative meanings in its folds and surfaces (Barnett 1999: 186) and seeming to ‘take on a bodily resonance rather than to offer up symbols as such’ (Nixon 2005: 174).
Knitting as therapy:
‘art as a form of therapy (Boltanski in Garb 1997: 9; Bourgeois in Wallach 2001). I suggest that this sense of vulnerability is another way that the artists construct different identities and subvert traditional representations of the body by making public things that are stereotypically regarded as private (Perry 1999: 29). Unfortunately, this is outside the scope of this article.
I will argue that although Bourgeois adopts the ‘feminine’ perspective of personal memories she actually challenges the gendered divide in the way that she installs the clothing she has chosen, creating a disquieting tension.’
Baker, L (2014) Second skin: used clothing in the works of Louise Bourgeois and Christian Boltanski Undergraduate dissertation Available at: https://www.academia.edu/32294698/Second_skin_used_clothing_and_representations_of_the_body_in_the_work_of_Louise_Bourgeois_and_Christian_Boltanski (Accessed 29 April 2020)
My work intentionally provokes a range of conflicting responses. For my undergraduate dissertation I researched the different ways that Louise Bourgeois and Christian Boltanski used second hand clothing in their work and the different meanings the clothing brought to their work. Although knitting is not the same as second hand clothing, there are clear links so I decided to revisit my journal article:
Knitting as body/second skin:
‘by using ‘familiar forms and shapes to reference the human body,’ both artists ‘… transgress the rules of normal representation of bodies’ (Arbus, date unknown).
Knitting and blurring of senses:
‘Through semiotics, clothing is regarded as a signifier, something external to the body (Chandler 2013), but clothing can also be seen as an extension of the body, a second skin (Bristow 2011: 48). I will explore ways in which the materiality and multi-sensory nature of clothing blurs the boundaries of visual and tactile experience (Bristow 2011: 45).
’In semiotic terms , clothing is external to the body, a signifier, and can signify many things including wealth, status, attitude and class (Prasarn 2012). However, there is a merging of the senses of touch and sight associated with cloth; ‘The eye…does not simply look. It also feels. Its response is both visual and tactile…’ the senses are ‘…each enfolded in the other’ (Barnett 1999: 185). This means that clothing can also be regarded as an extension of the body, a second skin. I suggest that the materiality and skin-like nature of cloth provides an alternative range of meanings to the use of clothing in art, operating ‘both through the haptic and the scopic simultaneously, the two modes of perception provide differing points of access to the viewer’ (Dormor 2008: 240).
Gender and knitting:
Cloth is widely regarded as a gendered material. Rozsika Parker discusses ‘the privatisation of female embroidery skills and their role in the inculcation of an ideology of femininity as devout, chaste, obedient...’ (in Carson 2000a: 27). She suggests that ‘...fine art was established as a public activity of high status associated with male professionals, while embroidery became a low status craft associated predominantly with women and domestic spaces’ (ibid). The links between embroidery and cloth are clear.
I think that choosing to use clothing, with its associations with craft and the feminine, instead of the more conventional materials of fine art, is another way that the artists subvert traditional representations of the body and produce ‘different sorts of images of...bodies’ (Perry 1999: 29).
Knitting and femininities/Knitting and Context: matter out of place
According to Rozsika Parker, cloth itself is a gendered material; in her book The Subversive Stitch, she analyses the gender divide between ‘high’ art and feminised craft (Parker 2010: 5; Carson 2000a: 27). She proposes that cloth is a signifier of the private, and thus feminine, sphere (Parker 2010: 5).
‘I will also explore the femininities associated with dirt. Mary Douglas, who describes dirt as ‘matter out of place’, observes that the categories of clean and unclean are ‘projected on to the female body’ (in Campkin and Cox 2007: 4; Carson 2000b: 63), while Julia Kristeva asserts that ‘sexual difference is at the heart of the social difference between clean and dirty’ (in Wolkowitz 2007:18). Also, worn clothes produce contamination anxiety, the private made public, which is yet another gender dichotomy (Carson 2000b: 55).’
Challenging expectations:
Her work, however, does highlight the ‘feminine concerns’ of the use of cloth in art and its ‘power to shock and unsettle conventional ideas about the sculptural object’ (Nochlin 2007: 191). Her fabric works, ‘despite their rejection of conventional notions of sculpture...share certain essential properties with conventional sculpture in bronze, clay or marble’ (ibid.). The power of this work, however, lies in the ‘departures from the niceties of the traditional media’ (ibid.). In Bourgeois’ stitched work, the ‘grotesque handiwork’ and the ‘deliberate ferocity of bad sewing’ challenges the gendered expectations of work with cloth (ibid.). In Pink Days and Blue Days (Fig. 1) I suggest that the contrast between the ephemeral baby blue and pink clothing with the bones as hangers also challenges those expectations.
Knitting and the abject:
‘suggest a physical absence, and ultimately death, which prompts an abject response. Kristeva describes ‘the abject’ as ‘the human reaction (horror, vomit) to a threatened breakdown in meaning caused by the loss of the distinction between subject and object or between self and other’ (in Felluga 2011). She goes on to argue that ‘the corpse is the utmost of abjection’ (Kristeva 1982: 13). Abjection also has associated femininities, linked to dirt and disgust.’
Julia Kristeva’s notion of ‘the abject’ is closely linked to the idea of pollution and consequently also has associated femininities. She describes it as a violent natural reflex of horror or disgust, a ‘combination of physical, moral and psychological reactions’ to an ‘external menace’ which also ‘may menace from inside’ (in Felluga 2011; Campkin and Cox 2007: 11, their italics). She claims ‘…nor is the abject ever simply ‘Body’: it is located wherever there is ambivalence, ambiguity, the improper or the unclean, the overflowing of boundaries, fusion and confusion, or whatever disturbs identity, system, order’ (Kristeva 1982: 4).
Hanging and the abject:
Hanging the garments also emphasises the sculpture’s ‘fragility and vulnerability’ (Larratt-Smith 2011). Bourgeois asserts that the hanging thing ‘…is very helpless’ (in Nixon 2005:170) and ‘Hanging and floating are states of ambivalence and doubt’ (in Larratt- Smith 2011). It is clearly significant to her. I think the hanging motif distinguishes ‘very different identities for (her) sculpture…suggesting a kind of displacement’ (Barlow 1996: 9) which also adds to the feeling of abjection.
The abject and border between public and private
Empty, used clothing inevitably has strong connotations with absence and death.
Immersion and the abject:
I suggest that participation also adds to the abjection. The public can walk through the installation and are immersed in it, ‘they are mostly looking down …they are not speaking…they become a part of the work’ (Boltanski in Rosenbaum- Kranson 2010). The harnessing of multiple senses, as discussed earlier, together with the ‘ceaseless, reverberating soundtrack of thousands of human heartbeats’ (Spears 2010) which accompanies the installation, adds to the immersion and amplifies the abjection. ‘And it’s this idea of being inside the work that is important to me.’ (Boltanski in Rosenbaum- Kranson 2010).
The piece evokes universal loss yet also prompts a personalised abject response. ‘Each one is within the piece, reading it how he or she wants to read it. For Jews here, it’s going to make them think about the Holocaust, but for people from Haiti, it’s going to make them think about the earthquake…’ (Boltanski in Rosenbaum-Kranson 2010) For others it will stir up private grief (Spear 2010).
Craft vs fine art:
I will explore the idea that by rejecting traditional fine art media and choosing to use discarded garments, their work questions the orthodoxy of the patriarchal hierarchy of ‘high art’ and challenges notions of embodiment. The materiality and multiple gender dichotomies associated with used clothing communicate complex meanings through their work. That clothing is an unconventional medium in fine art also adds to the meaning it conveys. Traditionally, hard, durable materials like stone, marble and bronze have been used for sculpture; the soft, impermanent nature of clothing, however, evokes the human form and its mortality, revealing alternative meanings in its folds and surfaces (Barnett 1999: 186) and seeming to ‘take on a bodily resonance rather than to offer up symbols as such’ (Nixon 2005: 174).
Knitting as therapy:
‘art as a form of therapy (Boltanski in Garb 1997: 9; Bourgeois in Wallach 2001). I suggest that this sense of vulnerability is another way that the artists construct different identities and subvert traditional representations of the body by making public things that are stereotypically regarded as private (Perry 1999: 29). Unfortunately, this is outside the scope of this article.
I will argue that although Bourgeois adopts the ‘feminine’ perspective of personal memories she actually challenges the gendered divide in the way that she installs the clothing she has chosen, creating a disquieting tension.’
Baker, L (2014) Second skin: used clothing in the works of Louise Bourgeois and Christian Boltanski Undergraduate dissertation Available at: https://www.academia.edu/32294698/Second_skin_used_clothing_and_representations_of_the_body_in_the_work_of_Louise_Bourgeois_and_Christian_Boltanski (Accessed 29 April 2020)