Elena Redmond

Region: Northeast

In my examination of the “self” and its iterations, I employ kitsch associations and humor to point at my own uncertainties and looming discomforts. These works act as extensions of myself, portraits of my anxieties, angers, habits, and physicality. The bodies are heavy, textured, swollen, and physical. Nakedness of the body paired with an eye-locking, dominant gaze are used to vulgarize feelings of being seen, the painting catching the viewer in voyeurism. Through self-portraiture, I utilize the vulnerability of sharing to give heaviness to loud colors, toying with standards, measurements, and expectations of smallness for the girls in each image. Wispy titles complicate and split the narrative; idioms and visual innuendos stitch the work tightly to what I ponder. I aim to question the structure through which we look at the body, in relation to choice, expectations, loudness, and definition. Femininity, largeness, roundness, and nakedness do not act as a detriment to the girls in the paintings but as the largest power, invading the associations surrounding them.