[RED]EFINE

A woman’s connection to her sexuality and her sexual desires is one that I wish I could have nurtured from an early age. I feel as if I could have been so much more confident now if I had been taught or saw within art, history, or pop culture that I should not be ashamed of or even sacred of sex. But instead, I was afraid of what a man might think of me or do to me. I felt like I was not allowed to be accepting of my body. I needed to hide it.

So, I decided to design a monument that would honor the thing I always thought I needed to hide away: sex. More specifically, I wanted to honor those who were involved in sex work. As I mentioned previously, there is a negative and destructive stigma around sex therefore it transfers to those who are involved in sex work. Yet, when the idea of sex is involved in a setting of what is considered to be ‘high art’ it can be praised. I found it extremely interesting that whenever the setting of sex changed then so did its reputation. Often times, a woman’s body parts like her hips or her breasts are accentuated in order to alert viewers of the female body’s ability to reproduce which also includes the act of sex. Nevertheless, when a woman chooses to embrace her sexual nature and enter into a workforce that embraces it as well, she is chastised for it. Thus, I wanted to attempt to illustrate this boundary within my monument while also attempting to break it down.

Moreover, it is important to go over my monument’s other inspiration: The Aphrodite of Knidos. In “Other “Ways of Seeing”: Female Viewers of the Knidian Aphrodite” by Mireille M. Lee (2015) the discussion for who was the intended viewer of the statue of the goddess of love was originally accepted as male. Her “scandalous nudity... elicited uncontrollable lust on the part of her male viewers” (103) making the statue’s nudity seen as simply some sort of erotica for males to tap into their own sexuality and their own desires. But Lee (2015) examined the Aphrodite of Knidos from a different perspective that is often forgotten from history: the female’s.

As I learned in class, the statue was the first statue to represent the female nude therefore it conflicted with the containment of the women in Greek culture. In exploring the female perspective, Lee (2015, 107) mentions Kristen Seaman (2004, 567), a feminist scholar, and her analysis of the Aphrodite of Knidos’s significance stating that the statue “is constructed as an authoritative sexual being, a woman in control of both her own sexuality”. With this new viewpoint of the Knidia, she now represents the idea that female power comes from sex and the woman’s ability to tap into her own sexuality even though they have no idea or are not allowed to know that they contain such power.

The Aphrodite of Knidos opens herself up to voyeurism in order to allow her female viewers to tap into the same sexual power that she evokes while also having power over male desire. This power is similar to that of sex workers, yet the attitudes toward the Aphrodite of Knidos and the attitudes of those involved in sex work differ greatly in society. Through Lee’s piece, the Knidia’s sexual nature is seen in a positive light. However, the Aphrodite of Knidos is also labeled as ‘high art’. The power she manifests is something I want to include into my monument, yet the woman for which she was modeled after is the other reason she inspired my monument as well. Since the Aphrodite of Knidos was the first physical representation of the female nude, it represented the unimaginable. Therefore, a courtesan by the name of Phryne was chosen as the model for the statue--a women who was connected to her body and showed her body openly through sex work.

Therefore, my monument [RED]EFINE includes five specific elements: the sex worker symbol, the female body and the nude, the Aphrodite of Knidos, the invisible barrier, and love. Firstly, I wanted to create a model of the nude body, however, I also wanted to be inclusive to many body types and to the fact that not all sex workers are women. So, I turned to photo collage in order to construct a body containing different aspects in order to involve as many different types of the nude as possible. Included in the collage would also be photographs of the Aphrodite of Knidos as well in order to embody the sexual power that she emanates and represents. I envisioned the collage to be life-size meaning that it would stand at about six feet or seven feet and at eye level, so people would be able to get as close as possible to it.

Additionally, there would be a neon light outline of a red umbrella hanging on top of the collage. The red umbrella not only is the sex worker symbol, but it also signifies protection for the body from elements that wish to harm it and the red color signifies love. The neon light would also be visible at night allowing for the art installation to not be forgotten. Plus, at night I envision there to be affirmations or words of self-love projected on the collage, in the hope that it would inspire people to view their bodies in a positive light. Lastly, I would encase the collage and the neon umbrella in a glass box to symbolize the invisible boundary that separates sex workers and their nudity from the praise that is given to nudity in high art like the Aphrodite of Knidos. The idea that sex workers suffer from being stuck behind this boundary that most people do not see or is simply unspoken is the thing that that needs to be addressed, and something I hope to not only depict but to [RED]EFINE though this monument.