Self Representation in the Arabian Gulf: Perspectives in Photography and Video: Gallery of the Virginia Commonwealth University School of Arts - Doha
"Manal Al-Dowayan enacts career portraits of historical Saudi women. At the same time she points to the role of the woman artist in contrast to the "respectable" careers of engineering and medicine. The images remind one of high school portraits in which the students are asked to imagine what they want to be when they grow up. They pose for the portraitist using props from the symbolic but generic pile of stuff. For Manal, the signifiers range from the petroleum engineer's hard-hat to the physician's stethoscope. What is striking is that behind the masquerade of the costumes the sharp gaze of the woman looks straight out at the viewer. Much like Cindy Sherman's Untitled Film Stills from the 70's, the gaze pierces through the image in an uncanny way, forcing us to reconsider the image entirely. However, unlike Sherman, Manal is not examining accepted representations of women in cinema. She is pointing out the absence of representations of women at work. Some costumes, like the engineer's hard-hat, look masculine on her, giving the image an absurd humor. I found myself asking: why should the idea of women at work be funny?"
Curator: Natalie Bailey, Sally Van Gorder
Artworks included: