Elise Putnam

Artist Statement: My practice combines drawing, performance and sculpture to critically investigate the western art historical trope of the long-wavy-blonde-haired feminine figure. This figure has ranged from Eve to Venus to Lucretia, and became a martyr for white purity in the 1914 film “The Birth of a Nation”. My subversive narrative drawings, performances, and sculptural objects mock the narcissistic self-referentiality of whiteness through satirical fetishization of the color white and depict a self-obsessed protagonist. These works make evident what we already know, contrary to art historical depictions, the white woman is not virtuous, noble, pure, innocent, or chaste. My works ask, "what does a white feminine body signify?"

Portfolio Images