Cindy Sherman + Tori Amos

I already knew a little of the peculiar work of Cindy Sherman. But when I visited the exhibition "Passage du Temps" of the Pinault Collection at the Tri Postal in Lille, I was all the more suprised by the photographs of this unique artist.


Born in New Jersey in 1954, Cindy Sherman first studied painting before shifting progressively to photography. Her work features whole series of self-portraits. She's one of the few successfully influential women photographers of her time.


I particulartly enjoy the "Bus Rider Series" (1976/2005)...


... as well as "Murder Mystery Series" (1976/2005). More recently, the "Clowns Series" (2004/2005) embodied perfectly this mixed feeling of humor and controversy that is constant in Sherman's work.


In 1989, to protest against the censorship threats that some fellow photographers had to undergo, Sherman presented the "Sex Series" with outrageous disembodied characters. Her work has often been said to be feminist. She points out major social questions - racism, relation to the body, plastic surgery) through her vision in which her body conveys a message and is not the subject in itself.


I can't help thinking of pop icon Tori Amos when I gaze into Sherman's photographies. Amos's artwork for "Strange Little Girls" in 2001 or "American Doll Posse" in 2007 showed us a series of characters embodying stereotyped women who reflect a fascinatingly complex America.