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NANCY
ROBINSON
In the early 1990s, painter Nancy Robinson claimed
the task of making “psychological portraits.” She
often deals with anxieties with dark, surreal humor and a clarity
that is completely lacking from the commercial advertising that
plays on these same anxieties so cynically. Body hair is one
such anxiety addressed in a number of Robinson’s paintings.
The Glamorous Vegetarian shows a worldly woman, in
heels and strapless gown, elegantly modeling a stole of her
own growing armpit hair. The same woman in a double portrait
is entwined with a type of Maypole both by her excessively long
armpit hair and a purple ribbon in The Tyranny of Fashion.
And in The Fear of Intimacy IV, the same hair radiates
out towards an obviously terrified man.
In
these paintings armpit hair – the stuff we American women
shave and perfume so religiously – becomes a symbol of
our deep fear of being offensive or revealing some great flaw.
Even while the figures in these paintings strike confident,
sexy poses, we recoil. Robinson continues the symbolic use of
hair in a portrait of a very hairy Mary Magdalene,
this time imposing this personal anxiety onto the historical
and collective psyche. Her hairiness here speaks to the ambivalent
role she plays in the Biblical narrative – the hair a
sign of her sensuality and also her shame.
But
hair is also psychically very powerful: remember how Samson
lost his strength when shorn? Indeed, in The Fear of Intimacy
IV the figure’s hair is aggressive, attacking the
man who puts his hands up to protect himself. Robinson sees
her work as part of the feminist project to reclaim women’s
power, and to show women as strong, sexual beings. Hair becomes,
then, a symbol of women’s innate power.
Speaking
of potent symbols, the phallic symbol is unavoidable in The
Secret Admirer V. Here man in a white suit holding a bouquet,
casually presents himself. A peeled banana in place of his head
hilariously reminds us of those encounters with individuals
with “only one thing on their minds” that mothers
have warned us about. The image is funny but shocking because,
like unwanted body hair, sexual urges and their recognition
are repressed in everyday life. Where The Secret Admirer
V is straightforward, Bobby and His Budgie is
confusing: a young man wearing a short skirt and long hair (hair
again!) holds up his pink, eyeless budgie with a flaming halo.
Is the budgie in heat? A sainted bird? Obviously phallic in
form, one has the sense that the budgie is conspiring with Bobby
to reveal something we’d rather not see.
KAREN
WILCOX | MICHAL SAGAR | RINA
YOON
Figure
& Psyche Homepage
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The Glamorous Vegeterian, 2002, oil on canvas
Mary
Magdalene,
2000, oil on canvas
Bobby
and His Budgie, 2004, oil on canvas
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