Censor This (2014)
"It is illegal for women to go topless in most cities, yet you can buy a magazine of a woman without her top on at any 7-11 store. So, you can sell breasts, but you cannot wear breasts, in America."
- Violet Rose
This body of work addresses the media's censorship of the female nipple. It speaks to the objectification and sexualization of the female in our society and the issue that a nipple is censored because it belongs to a female. My series of work is a typology of nipples, male and female, in an exploration of the body, the similarities and differences between the genders, and by exposing what we are accustomed to having hidden. The work deals with themes of fragmentation of the body, representation, notions of looking, and gender.
With Facebook, Instagram, and other online media constantly policing images of breastfeeding, body hair, and women of curvaceous figures --all perfectly acceptable in real life-- the series is in response to the male gaze, hyper-sexualization, and questioning what images, and why, are deemed 'inappropriate'.
10 - 12.5"x12.5" inkjet prints. 120 Medium Format.