It is not a common thing to see an artist display her sexuality so blatantly in her own exhibition. There is an odd photographic exhibition in the Guggenheim Museum. Through the exhibition, gays and lesbians try to gain visibility and support from the larger community as a whole. The photographer, Catherine Opie, also presents her difficult lesbian journey though her photos.
Catherine Opie is a professor at University of California at Los Angeles. From 1990s, she has produced a series of photos exploring the sexual and cultural identity of homosexuals. Through her portraits from 1993 to 2004, we can see that she is openly presenting herself as a lesbian. In her Self-Portrait/Pervert, 1994 she cut her chest’s skin to write “Pervert.” Her upper torso is naked but she is wearing a leather mask to cover her face. At the beginning, I thought the leather mask represented execution. After I finished looking at all of her photos I discovered that it represented the S/M royalty and sexual practice. Plus, she put many needles into her two arms. I felt the hurt and I did not understand why she did that to herself. Catherin and her community are searching for their own identity and their own way to happiness.
In her Self-Portrait/cutting, 1993 it is indeed disturbing to see that her friend had cut her back to draw two women holding hands, a cloud with a half sun and a house. The two cartoon characters represent a couple; the house represents home and the sun-happiness. However, I think it is very powerful to present how she felt about the painful journey she had been through in marrying another woman in this extreme and usual manner. In 1990, people did not understood homosexual and transgendered people. Cutting Catherine’s skin was painful, and symbolized the pain of the rejection by the people around her because she is a lesbian. However, she wanted to show clearly as she redefined her own identity.
Another picture I saw was Self-Portrait/Nursing, 2004. She is holding her son and breast feeding. They are looking at each other. Both her son and she are naked. The back ground is fabric with traditional flower shape patterns and in browns and oranges. When I used my hand to cover Catherin’s head and her tattoos, I felt the motherhood and the traditional warmth of a mom feeding a child. However, when I look at Catherin in her entirety, it destroyed my warm feelings because of her man-like short hair, serious face, a tattoo on her arm and scar on her chest. These personal manifestations totally contradict what I expect to see in a mother. She is a lesbian but she is breastfeeding her child. She takes the traditional way of being a mom but she calls herself ”husband.” This photo is an old fashioned image of a mother caring for a child. We can see she is more comfortable with her identity by showing her face in this picture as compared to the 1993 and 1994 self portraits, either with mask or with an unidentifiable rear shot.
In conclusion, Catherin Opie is successful in letting people know her and her homosexual community development though the time period from 1990 to 2004. Cutting the word “Pervert” on her chest was a symbol of healing. As the scar heals day by day, so does peoples prejudice against homosexuality. She is a symbol of the lesbian community’s evolvement.