Andrea Mary Marshall created a feminist 'pin up' calendar based on the Pirelli calendar which tends to show women in an overly sexual manner - intended to be looked at by men
"The women are almost always nearly (or totally) naked, and they are styled to embody a variety of conventionally "sexy" traits: pursed lips, flowing hair, arched back, heavy eyelids.
To engage the calendar in a more feminist lens, Marshall created her own calendar using photos of herself. For each month of 2016, Marshall is shown in two juxtaposing images: one of her in a conventionally "sexy" pose, and one with her more vulnerable and barefaced" (Rachel Lubitz, Mic.com)
"That idea of ownership is crucial for Marshall. Rather than having her image taken by someone else, Marshall's pictures have her fully in control — modeling, planning the shots and taking them herself with a timed shutter. And in that sense, Marshall is creating a feminist space where a woman is exposing herself on her own terms and, equally as powerful, showing herself in a minimalist light, stripped of "sexy" convention."
https://mic.com/articles/126758/andrea-marshalls-feminist-calendar-puts-a-new-spin-on-pirelli#.ZJ0in7PzUAs the work of this artist responds to the Pirelli Calendar - a product generally marketed for a male audience, by mimicking the visual language through the more 'sexual' or 'glamorous' self portraits and juxtaposing it with a 'barefaced' image she subverts the gaze.
Like a lot of feminist art I saw at the "feminist avant garde" exhibition this work sort of plays on the presentation of women in the media as either a 'virgin' or a 'whore', boiling women down to these roles rather than accepting the fact that women are multi-faceted beings with more than two settings.
She also brings up some points that I am interested in about intent of the author and how that influences the work and the viewers perception of the work. Work generally needs to come with a context, does work lose it's meaning when the context is not included?
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