Being In
By Alana West
The ways in which artists Ida Arentoft and Kate Schneider engage with the landscape through their photographs fascinates me and prompts me to question if there is an inherently feminist approach to this genre that both utilize. Within the history of landscape photography there is a tradition of documenting the land as a means to control and lay claim to it, one that historically is dominated by patriarchal values.*1 A common feature of these works is the use of the horizon line as a means to position the viewer in a specific site and indicate what is of importance within the frame in capitalistic, geographical, or historical terms. With the work of Arentoft and Schneider the horizon line is subverted in a way that challenges the notion of the primacy of self and self-interest in the landscape. Instead, both artists undermine the authority of the horizon line in an effort to allow space for experience, memory, and stewardship.
In the section Place, three of Arentoft’s images are presented as a triptych (see images Sand Pattern / River and Rocks #2 / Pink).*2 In these three images, Arentoft has chosen to frame each image with no horizon line. By doing so the viewer focuses their attention not on the specificity of the site but instead on the textures of the landscape. The removal of the horizon line isn’t an act of subjugation; instead it enables each image to embody a sensorial echo. You can see how the water receded and left its trace on the sand, you can almost hear the soothing rush of water as it navigates a path through the rocks, and you can recall what it is like to feel the blistering heat of the sun as it bakes exposed mud on the seashore pink. Arentoft does not hoard or lay claim to these sites. Instead, she shares these personal experiences with the viewer in a corporeal way.
“There is a being in the landscape rather than the desire to dominate or control”
To have and acknowledge a bodily experience in nature is also fundamental to Schneider’s work. Included in Identity / Connection / Place are a series of eight images where Schneider physically engages with natural forms from her surrounds, such as rocks and sticks. In two, presented as a diptych (see from The Weight of Your Cool Embrace in the section Place), Schneider holds aloft a rock that rests precariously on her forearm. In these images the horizon line is mirrored in the gestural movement of her hands and the placement of her arms thereby situating her within the landscape as part of it and not separate from it. The fragility of the act of placing a fragment of stone on her forearm and balancing it there is a poetic reminder of our place within the natural world and stresses that we are both guests and stewards of the land we inhabit. There is a tension created between Schneider’s intervention and the care in which she holds this earthbound element up, suspended until it returns to its terrestrial resting place. The horizon line in Schneider’s work is a familial point of location and does not define the site as a means to commodify it. Instead, the horizon line allows the gestures and reverence of the artist’s interaction with nature to be highlighted.
There is a being in the landscape rather than the desire to dominate or control that both Arentoft and Schneider’s work engage with. For both photographers the need to capture these moments is not an act of domination but rather one that honours where they find themselves within the world. Their subversion of the horizon line is a way to challenge the traditional masculine eye that dominates landscape photography and asserts the importance of a feminist way of seeing that incorporates a corporeal connection to place.
*1 In the 19th century such examples include Carleton Watkin’s photographs taken of the American west for the California State Geological Survey and William Henry Jackson’s work for the Union Pacific and the US Government Survey.
*1 The decision to place these three images together was that of the curators of Identity / Connection / Place with the assistance of their art director and as Jennifer Long pointed out this was not the choice of the artist, so although the three images read as a triptych on the website this was a curatorial decision.
Lemon as
Love Letter
By Alana West
In 2020, artist Flannery O’kafka turned the camera on themself in an attempt to see their body for the first time.*1 The resultant first two images are fascinating in what is shown and what is hidden. Reflected in a mirror, O’kafka’s face is obscured; the horizontal spike of an aloe plant bisects the frame and contrasts the curves of the leaves of a pothos above and the artist’s buxom body below. In these two images (one showing the front and the other the back of the artist), O’kafka stands with a hip raised, reminiscent of a pin-up pose. This is a tentative self-portrait, one where the static vertical lines of the plant pot and the chaos of the foliage in the upper half of the image overshadow O’kafka’s body in the background. There is a tension between what is hidden and what is visible and the artist’s attempt to see their body for the first time.
Whereas the first self-portraits are cautious in what is shown, other images in this series are bolder and more self-assured. One such example is an image where pleasing oneself is visually explored (see Untitled from Only Fanzine, 2020, found on the artist’s page in the online exhibition Identity / Connection / Place). In this image, O’kafka’s left hand rests under sheer red lingerie, their middle finger is placed at the top of their labia majora, and their thumb presses into their belly button. The indent on their flesh is subtle yet suggestive. Through these two points of contact, O’kafka perfectly captures self-pleasure in a way that feels familiar and personal without being voyeuristic. The inclusion of details, such as the ingrown hair on their leg and the stretch marks on their belly repudiate any attempt to categorize this image as pornographic. Instead, these details allow for the appreciation of the vulnerable space this image occupies, one where sexuality is shown with the artist in control of what is seen. The image is subversive in its denial to succumb to the male gaze and reduce O’kafka to a sexual object for visual pleasure. Instead, desire is visualized as the wish to be seen not as an object but as a subject full of needs and wants.
“loving myself and others is still dangerous . . . enjoying my body and looking at it with kindness is still an act of resistance.
On O’kafka’s artist page in the online exhibition Identity / Connection / Place, there are four images that appear and disappear. Something interesting happens with the way these images reside in a liminal space, like a thought or a wish that isn’t fulfilled so it keeps returning. At the bottom of the page there are two images (see Untitled and Untitled, Collaboration with Kirsty Mackay) that replace each other and depending on the timing either image can be seen first – a lemon or a portrait of the artist lying on their bed. Beside these images is a poem. In repose the artist looks relaxed and as if she might be sleeping or daydreaming. O’kafka’s left hand rests tenderly on their right shoulder. The lemon, we are told, was taken into bed with the artist like a baby or a lover. These two images and the poem speak of self-love and acceptance. The colour palette is calm and soothes after the exciting reds in the images at the top of the page. In this portrait, O’kafka exists in a safe space bathed in light and allows us the privilege to join in this moment of ease and grace.
A willingness to explore one’s sexuality and body image photographically takes courage and vulnerability. In a recent Instagram story O’kafka noted that, “loving myself and others is still dangerous . . . enjoying my body and looking at it with kindness is still an act of resistance.”*2 In O’kafka’s work there is no space for shame. Instead, their work is about desire – the desire to be seen as we are, to be a body that is desired, and that feels desire. There is power in the ability to look closely at oneself and O’kafka’s self-portraits read to me as sweet love letters to the self – and who doesn’t enjoy witnessing new love?
*1 See Body I and II: First two photographs of my body that I ever made, an attempt to see myself – a time for stormy weather, 2020 [two images].
*2 Flannery O’kafka, post to Instagram Story, Instagram, February 14, 2023.