Helen Gorrill

Forthcoming: Launch of SIN, limited edition giclee prints of the New Generation Dominatrix series. 

Interview for feature on 'The Erotic Chair' for the relaunch of Skin Two magazine, available 1st October 2010

“In the 'liberal' and affluent West, 'power' is undeniably in vogue, not only with those who debate its meaning; 'submission' most emphatically is not - unless perhaps as a titilating form of sexual bondage."*

My work is concerned with destabilising gender and investigating the female submissiveness advocated by Christianity, politics and social conditions.  Christianity has given us the controlled and submissive image of Woman, and throughout most of art history Women have been presented as passive and controlled objects of the Male gaze.  Taking influence from Butler’s Gender Trouble, my 2d work is created using water-based ink to create a bleeding and merging of colour within a finely defined area in order to demonstrate the fluidity of gender.  My sculptural work is both life-size and sculpted from life, and its direct emotional power challenges the viewers preconceptions associated with gender.

 *Sarah Coakley in "Powers and Submissions: Spirituality, Philosophy and Gender (Challenges in Contemporary Theology)" published by Blackwell

 

Painter, Sculptor