Tag: Cindy Sherman

Cindy Sherman, born in 1954 in Glen Ridge, NJ, currently resides and works in New York, NY. With a career spanning over four decades, Sherman’s groundbreaking work has continuously explored themes of representation and identity in contemporary media. Emerging in the late 1970s as part of the influential Pictures Generation alongside artists like Sherrie Levine, Richard Prince, and Louise Lawler, Sherman initially delved into photography during her studies at Buffalo State College in the early 1970s.

In 1977, upon her move to New York City, Sherman embarked on her acclaimed Untitled Film Stills series, marking the beginning of her artistic journey. Over the years, she has consistently deconstructed and reconstructed familiar personas, often in unsettling ways. By the mid to late 1980s, Sherman’s visual language evolved to explore the more grotesque aspects of humanity through works like Fairy Tales (1985) and Disasters (1986-89). These highly visceral images incorporated visible prostheses and mannequins, a theme later extended in series like Sex Pictures (1992), adding layers of artifice to her constructed female identities.

Sherman’s renowned History Portraits, initiated in 1988, utilized theatrical effects to challenge rather than maintain any sense of illusion. Since the early 2000s, she has incorporated digital technology to manipulate her characters further. Notable series like Clown (2003) introduced psychedelic backdrops, exploring the contrast between exterior personas and interior psychology. Society Portraits (2008) employed green screens to create elaborate environments for women of high societal standing, emphasizing the veneer-like charm and societal status in the face of aging.

In her Flappers series from 2016, Sherman confronts the vulnerability of aging, portraying 1920s Hollywood starlets in glamorous attire from their prime with exaggerated makeup. Utilizing Instagram from 2017 onwards, Sherman shares portraits using face-altering apps, transforming herself into a variety of protagonists against kaleidoscopic settings. These disorienting and uncanny posts underscore the dissociative nature of Instagram from reality. Explore Cindy Sherman’s diverse and thought-provoking body of work, capturing the essence of identity and societal perceptions over the years.