Lisa Yuskavage
Below is an excerpt of an interview between Jayson Whitehead and the painter Lisa Yuskavage I found on Gladfly Online. Among other things, they discuss the “male gaze”, her softly-hued nude paintings, feminism, and audience…
JW: You’ve said in other interviews that you paint from the “male gaze,” “painting paintings that take the point of view of a man.” You stated: “I decided to make paintings that would be the dumbest, most far-out extension of what I was trying to say [about] male desire.” Is that still an accurate description of your work?
LY: I said that about five years ago. I kind of regret it because I’ve changed what I believe. It became clear to me that my work’s really not about the “male gaze” but about my own gaze. That comment has been stuck in my face a lot. People have made that concept very boring.
When I said it I was really struggling. I changed my paintings at that point. Women had always been the subject of my work, or in some instances it was me more but at the time it was hard to do what I needed to do from the point of view of just being Lisa. I was taking on another persona. I was young, starting out and very unsure if what I was doing was right. So I really needed to be more definite. If I could rewrite it, because the “male gaze” has become a bullshit word, I would say that I was taking on the character of a very particular man, like Dennis Hopper in Blue Velvet. I was taking as much of a character like that and as specifically as that. I was trying to torture the painting a little bit and it was actually kind of fun. It was more fun to do that than to be me because I’m much more timid and respectful. In a way, it was a little like a bedroom game. I found this incredible liberation in doing that, but I don’t need to do that as strictly now. Today I free associate like the wind. I just bang around. As me, I’m much more confident doing various things.
But I’m not afraid of what the “male gaze” means. I’ve gotten a lot of shit for it. If people don’t like what I’m doing nothing anybody says will make it better. I don’t understand why people can’t just look at them as paintings. I always find it amazing that when as a young person I looked at paintings of Venus and Adonis, I never said as a young feminist, “Well, why doesn’t she get clothes?” I just looked at the painting and was like, “Fuck me, this is amazing.”
keep reading the interview - click here
Lisa Yuskavage, Brood, oil on linen, 2005-2006
Lisa Yuskavage, Wrist Corsage, oil on linen, 1996
Lisa Yuskavage, Northview, oil on linen, 2000
