"I took the photo as a Talisman to remind myself that I had some rights over my own body" - Jo Spence

I am really interested in the subject of the body within art and photography. It’s an aspect of ourselves that we take for granted yet it’s the one that gives others their first opinion of us, likewise, it's how we immediately judge other people, whether consciously or not. Not just our physical appearance in terms of weight, height, hair colour etc, but our body language and how we hold ourselves, the vibes that we give out through our physicality.

I have looked in greater detail at the theme of the body for an essay at Uni.  We were given a selection of titles to choose from to write a 2,500 word illustrated essay, I went for the one “What are the ways in which a body is used as a sight of meaning”. I started by doing a mind map for myself to see what ideas I had, names/themes that cropped up on there were “Jo Spence-trying to gain back control of her body from medical institution”,  “Cindy Sherman’s mutilated body part dolls”, “Laura Mulvey’s :Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema”, Berger’s A Cultural Way of Seeing”, “Barbra Kruger art works”. I have way too many ideas and needed to cut it down. I decided that I would rather go into a couple of areas in great depth as opposed to lots of areas in a shallow and superficial way. I focused on the body as a product of consumer culture: including the ways in which the body is defragmented and dehumanised in order to sell products, the techniques used to distort the body, touching upon the male gaze. This then led me into my second area, using the body as a form of control: photographers who have tried to seize back control of the gaze through different techniques, including Jo Spence, Hannah Wilke, Jemima Stehli and Annie Sprinkle.

I’m very glad that I chose this essay to do, I’ve learnt so much through my research and….despite sounding like a bit of a nerd…I actually really enjoyed writing the essay. Here is an extract from my essay:

"However there are examples of artists who have tried to seize back control of their bodies and the gaze. Jo Spence photographed her journey through breast cancer. Her self-portraits showed her bearing her naked body to the camera, showing her scars. In one photo she is topless with the words “property of Jo Spence?” written in pen on her left breast. She said that she took this picture as a “talisman to remind myself that I had some rights over my own body” (Spence, 1986, p157).  Spence puts forth the ideas that a woman never truly has control over her body, in particular her breasts. As a young woman they are objects of desire to be looked at by men and part of the gaze, as a mother they are used by babies for nutrition and as she gets older, as in Spence’s case, often falls into the hands of the medical profession when she gets breast cancer. Jo Spence and friend Rosy Martin started developing what they called Photo Therapy. They would act out situations from their childhood, dressing up as characters such as their parents or teachers to find new ways of perceiving the past and ways of dealing with these and moving on from them. Using techniques that they learned from co-counselling, physcho-drama and the reframing technique taken from neuro-linguistic programming therapy, they found new ways to present their visual selves/bodies to the camera. By using their own bodies to reinvent these moments they can reclaim the pleasure in looking and of control over the meaning. Through photo-therapy they could open up about private suffering and grief to insist that the body represents an individual’s identity and not just the site of male desire. They challenge the idea of the breast as a focus for female identity. Spence uses control over the body as a metaphor - “our photographic work should show women trying to have more control over their bodies, as part of women’s struggles generally to have more control” (Spence, 1986, p209). Spence is using the idea of control of the body to also express how women should take more control of their lives in general, whether it be at home, work, relationships etc."

 I recently got my mark back for this essay, I got a First and my tutor told me it was the best that he'd seen out of all the class, so I was very happy :-)