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Moira Lovell

London &
Artist who responds to prosumer images: reenacting selfie poses, dressing as the image, "smizing", saying "prune", following tutorials to deconstruct the language of the selfie
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Moira's current work explores, through performance-for-camera video and photographic self-portraiture, the construction of selfies and how this construction shapes women’s experience of their bodies and selfhoods, concentrating on the opportunities afforded by everyday and ubiquitous modes of digital image making. It focuses most specifically on a repertoire of poses that women repeat, internalise, and perform, over and over, to supposedly help transform themselves into a fantasy image for the self(ie)-representation, in the digital age.

In the earlier series The After School Club (2006/7) young women, whom she photographed whilst wearing provocative schoolgirl outfits in themed nightclubs, are returned in daylight to their secondary school gates in similar revellers garb. The resulting photographs of the club-wisened alumni are oddly comic, but there is a more powerful feeling of pathos, nostalgia, and the acid tinge of naivety corrupted and exploited.

Stand Your Ground (2008) commissioned by Pavilion features the Doncaster Rovers Belles women's football team and the relationship between the players and their male coach. This double portrait series offers a wry view of team relations, compounded by the use of a soundtrack of the touchline directions from the coach, in a crucial match against the Arsenal women's team. Apparently gentle portraits again become uncomfortable examinations of gender and power.  

We Still Stand (2009/11), supported by the National Media Museum Photography Bursary, Lovell  photographed individuals and groups of former coal miners and comrades at night on the sites of their former colliery and picket grounds 25 years after battles were fought and lost. The photographic encounters build an uneasy portrait of something 'that-has-been'.

Performing Tourism (2013/14), feature tourists in situ, positioned in front of the monuments where they were found. They speak unabashedly of the time they are made. This is partly due to the clothing they adorn and partly due to the corporeal experience of selfie making - standing still, displaying oneself in a condition of stasis, with an arm stretched out, addressing the camera with intense concentration. Clearly signifying the early twenty-teens, an age when cameras converged with phone technology.  These images have been manipulated so that the device at which the subjects intently gaze has been removed. By turns the tourists appear at once absurd, sculptural and performative.

 

Pronouncing "Prune"

White Off the Shoulder Bodycon Dress (2019)

White Denim Shorts (2020)

Strappy Cowl Neck Midi Dress (2019)

Strapless Bandeau Short Dress (2019)

Sparkly Backless Dress (2020)

Snake Print Slinky Plunge Jumpsuit (2020)

Shorts Playsuit Blue and White Striped (2020)

Sheer Jewelled Back with Pleated Skirt (2020)

Sexy Black Sheer See Through Dress (2019)

Ribbed Knit Pencil Mini Dress (2020)

Red Wide Leg Trousers (2020)

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Curated

Curated Selection: Representations of Gender

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