Zero to Three Months
The Windows Gallery (2008)
PRACTICE
I am a London-based artist working with costume, performance, sculpture and installation. My studio practice is concerned with what Rozsika Parker called the subversive stitch: my performative work is site-specific. My subject matter reflects an interest in feminist theory and embodies ambiguity and the tension of opposites and I am drawn to make work which invites closer inspection, with things not being what they seem.
This site shows recent work exploring the performative nature of costume, with an emphasis on its potential for constructing and articulating power relations, gender and sexuality.
WORK
The artwork draws on classic costume iconography. At first glance the objects appear seductive and delicate: a baby's quilt, a christening robe, wedding shoes, gloves and a wedding dress. However, on closer inspection they carry a challenging brutality: looking beyond the first impressions, one can see embroidered text running through the fabric of the infant's robe repeating the obscenties 'fucking little shit', whilst 'shut the fuck up before I kill you' runs across the quilt; the shoes and gloves have been made from a material covered in the text 'useless whore'; and the wedding dress has been formed to incorporate a straight-jacket.
The baby clothes series addresses and challenges the increasingly wide-spread sexualisation of children through inappropriate garment design. This work, a range of disturbingly sexualised babies' bodysuits, has been the subject of guerrilla installations and shop-dropping in some of the stores engaged in marketing the children's clothing in question. In May 2008 the objects were assembled as a collection, Zero to Three Months, for exhibition in The Windows Gallery in London's SoHo area, and in February 2009 Zero to Three Months was shown at the University of Surrey's Lewis Elton Gallery in Guildford, alongside a new body of work and a series of images of the guerrilla installations. Selected work from the Zero to Three Months project was recently on show in The Affluenza Exhibition in Clerkenwell, EC1 in March, in which context the work references the consequences of an over-concern with appearance, commoditisation and irresponsible design-led marketing practice.
Sue Healey
March 2009
The baby clothes series addresses and challenges the increasingly wide-spread sexualisation of children through inappropriate garment design. This work, a range of disturbingly sexualised babies' bodysuits, has been the subject of guerrilla installations and shop-dropping in some of the stores engaged in marketing the children's clothing in question. In May 2008 the objects were assembled as a collection, Zero to Three Months, for exhibition in The Windows Gallery in London's SoHo area, and in February 2009 Zero to Three Months was shown at the University of Surrey's Lewis Elton Gallery in Guildford, alongside a new body of work and a series of images of the guerrilla installations. Selected work from the Zero to Three Months project was recently on show in The Affluenza Exhibition in Clerkenwell, EC1 in March, in which context the work references the consequences of an over-concern with appearance, commoditisation and irresponsible design-led marketing practice.
Sue Healey
March 2009