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My viewing body does not end at the skin (excerpt)

Over the past few years I have somehow accumulated a collection of cards, images and prints above my desk. Some were given to me by students, or are copies of my own work, most are postcards and exhibition invites. As I sit and prepare to write this text three images stand out and demand their part in my discussion. One is an unidentified image of Cleopatra with an asp. Cleopatra gently holds the snake to her exposed breast, she seems to be caressing its head as she stares absently into its open mouth, it could be her child she is holding. Beside Cleopatra is a National Gallery bookmark of Saint Lucy. Eyelids blindly rolled to the sky, Lucy presents her extracted eyes on a platter. The third image is by Dunedin artist Teresa Andrew. Titled "Femininity as disease" (1997) the print shows three women bound by corsets and hooped skirts. In their midst is a forth figure; she is naked, bound to a stake, her face is covered, her flesh hurts. She disturbs me more than the images around her. Why is it that all these images stick in my mind? And why does the incongruity of this contemporary figure make me return to her again and again? I do not <I> like <I> this picture, but I will not take it down from the wall...

Susan Ballard is a lecturer in Art History and Theory at the School of Art, Otago Polytechnic, in Dunedin New Zealand. Her research and teaching areas include: issues surrounding the production, articulation and curatorial display of visual images; relationships between art, technology and the body; discussions of gender with regard to contemporary art; and theories and practices of art writing.