Cindy Sherman & Hiroshi Sugimoto
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Photography has long been more than merely a means of recording reality, though most people do think of photography as a journalistic or documentary device. Many artists in recent years have turned to the technology of photography as an alternative to artistic forms they believe are no longer viable or effective, or as a means of delving into certain aspects of their culture that they feel they cannot reach in any other way. The "reality" of the photograph is often an illusion, and what may seem to be apparent on the surface of a photograph may hide much deeper meanings and relationships if the viewer takes a closer look. Cindy Sherman is a leading American artist working through photography and showing a new range over the last twenty years. Hiroshi Sugimoto in Japan has come to the fore during that same period of time and experiments with images important in his culture and our own. A comparison of the two shows the range of photographic expression possible and some of the trends in photo art over the period in which they have been working. Cindy Sherman was born in 1954 and debuted as a photographer with a series of black-and-white photographs in 1977-1980. In these photos, she herself appeared in a series of guises resembling nonspecific characters form Hollywood melodramas, providing a postmodern commentary on the stereotyped roles of women as depicted by men in movies, television, advertising, fashion spreads, and magazine centerfolds. She used makeup, wigs, c
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the photos and the fact that Sherman was supine in them reminded the viewer of centerfolds. Unlike models in centerfolds, however, Sherman's women are not smiling, evoking two major themes, one involving the determined stylization of references to popular imagery against the immediacy of woman-as-victim. Some critics, however, interpreted the series as showing women's liberation from the roles of society. Sherman herself indicated her purpose in an interview:
I wanted to make the viewers embarrassed or disappointed in themselves for having certain expectations upon realizing that they had invaded a poignant or critically personal moment in this character's life.
Sherman's power as an artist derives in part from her accessibility, her ability to speak to the general public, though contrarily her photography is not always easy to look at because much of its resonance has to do with what it says about women and about the ways in which our culture perceives women. Sherman has seized on an issue that has vitality in the present age and has done so in a way that is appealing and communicative. She started documenting images of women that seemed to refer to nothing specific but that nonetheless captured society's prevailing cl
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Approximate Word count = 2765
Approximate Pages = 11 (250 words per page)
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