Photograph, gelatin silver print on paper
Tate Collection
Works with images
General Collection
ARTIST ROOMS
National Heritage Memorial Fund
Art Fund
Collection
<a href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/francesca-woodman-10512" aria-label="More by Francesca Woodman" data-gtm-name="header_link_artist" data-gtm-destination="page--artist">Francesca Woodman</a>
Providence Rhode Island
ARTIST ROOMS
Acquired jointly with the National Galleries of Scotland through The d'Offay Donation with assistance from the National Heritage Memorial Fund and the Art Fund 2008
actions: postures and motions
adults
book - non-specific
document - non-specific
emotions, concepts and ideas
female
formal qualities
furnishings
interiors
mirror
named individuals
natural phenomena
nudes
objects
people
photographic
portraits
reading, writing, printed matter
reflection
self-portraits
sitting
standing
studio
woman
Woodman, Francesca
workspaces
<p>In this black and white photograph Francesca Woodman, naked and looking at the camera, appears seated on a cushioned wooden stool low to the ground with her left arm covering her left breast and her toes curling around the edges of a rug. On the rug to her right stands an unidentified naked woman whose head is out of the frame and whose right hand rests on her belly. A mirror propped against the wall behind her reflects the shadowed backs of her legs. Words are scrawled on the wall above the mirror and, above these, two cloths hang from a horizontal beam, one showing several unclear words and an image. Above Woodman a photograph is tacked to the wall, as well as another cloth that hangs lopsided. The left third of the image is dominated by shelves that contain books, papers and bottles of different sizes. Below the shelves an array of papers and various objects sit on the floor.</p>
paper print photograph gelatin silver
14 March 2009 – 8 November 2009
2009-11-08
12 March 2009 – 8 November 2009
2009-11-08
2009-03-12
Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art (Edinburgh, UK)
http://www.nationalgalleries.org/
2009-03-14
ARTIST ROOMS Francesca Woodman
Collection based display
11 June 2011 – 23 October 2011
2011-10-23
11 June 2011 – 23 October 2011
2011-10-23
2011-06-11
Ferens Art Gallery (Hull, UK)
http://www.hullcc.gov.uk/museumcollections
2011-06-11
ARTIST ROOMS 2011: Francesca Woodman
Loan-out
5 April 2014 – 13 July 2014
2014-07-13
5 April 2014 – 13 July 2014
2014-07-13
2014-04-05
Bodelwyddan Castle (Bodelwyddan, UK)
2014-04-05
ARTIST ROOMS 2014: Francesca Woodman
Loan-out
15 November 2014 – 25 February 2015
2015-02-25
15 November 2014 – 25 February 2015
2015-02-25
2014-11-15
Oriel Davies Gallery (Newtown, UK)
2014-11-15
ARTIST ROOMS 2014: Francesca Woodman
Loan-out
18 February 2016 – 12 June 2016
2016-06-12
18 February 2016 – 12 June 2016
2016-06-12
2016-02-18
Tate Modern (London, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/modern/
2016-02-18
Performing for the Camera
Exhibition
Untitled, Providence, Rhode Island
image: 128 × 129 mm
frame: 458 × 420 × 20 mm
<a href="/search?gid=999999788" data-gtm-name="tombstone_link_bequest" data-gtm-destination="list-page--search-results">ARTIST ROOMS</a>
Acquired jointly with the National Galleries of Scotland through The d'Offay Donation with assistance from the <a href="/search?gid=999999967" data-gtm-name="tombstone_link_bequest" data-gtm-destination="list-page--search-results">National Heritage Memorial Fund</a> and the <a href="/search?gid=999999968" data-gtm-name="tombstone_link_bequest" data-gtm-destination="list-page--search-results">Art Fund</a> 2008
<div class="text">
<p>In this black and white photograph Francesca Woodman, naked and looking at the camera, appears seated on a cushioned wooden stool low to the ground with her left arm covering her left breast and her toes curling around the edges of a rug. On the rug to her right stands an unidentified naked woman whose head is out of the frame and whose right hand rests on her belly. A mirror propped against the wall behind her reflects the shadowed backs of her legs. Words are scrawled on the wall above the mirror and, above these, two cloths hang from a horizontal beam, one showing several unclear words and an image. Above Woodman a photograph is tacked to the wall, as well as another cloth that hangs lopsided. The left third of the image is dominated by shelves that contain books, papers and bottles of different sizes. Below the shelves an array of papers and various objects sit on the floor.</p>
<p>This photograph was created while Woodman was a student at the Rhode Island School of Design (RISD) in Providence from 1975 to 1978. At RISD Woodman was a fiercely dedicated and independent student who devoted herself exhaustively to her work. She set up a studio and living space in the shabby rooms of a former dry goods store, and frequently worked in nearby abandoned houses and other rundown spaces. This work features Woodman prominently as its subject. When asked by her roommate and close friend Sloan Rankin why she was so often the subject of her own photographs, Woodman replied: ‘It’s a matter of convenience, I’m always available’ (quoted in Rankin 1998, p.35). This photograph is also notably small-scale. Woodman’s square photographs rarely measure more than fifteen centimetres in height or width.</p>
<p>In this photograph the compositional ‘decapitation’ of the standing woman exemplifies the violent use of cropping, often used in Woodman’s work (see, for example, Tate <a class="acno-pop" data-gtm-destination="page--artwork" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/woodman-me-and-benjamin-in-may-ar00360" title="View the details of this artwork"><span>AR00360</span></a> and <a class="acno-pop" data-gtm-destination="page--artwork" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/woodman-untitled-new-york-ar00362" title="View the details of this artwork"><span>AR00362</span></a>). The cropping of one of the two subjects suggests that Woodman treated the two bodies with no more importance than the objects lying around them. Writing about Woodman’s work, the critic Margaret Sundell has argued that, in photography, ‘not only is the [subject’s] body submitted to a flattened surface, one’s subjectivity is also imperiled in [the] movement from flesh to image’ (quoted in Sundell 1996, p.439). In this image the compositional beheading of the woman on the left renders her body anonymous, suggesting that Woodman was experimenting with the loss of subjectivity. Indeed, art historian Harriet Riches has written that, by ‘taking advantage of the camera’s ability to crop and frame the body’, Woodman ‘exploits a photographic language of violence, as she explores the medium’s proclivity for excising subjectivity from the world’ (Riches 2004, p.99).</p>
<p>
<b>Further reading</b>
<br/>Margaret Sundell, ‘Vanishing Points: The Photography of Francesca Woodman’ in M. Catherine de Zegher (ed.), <i>Inside the Visible: An Elliptical Traverse of 20th Century Art: In, of, and from the Feminine</i>, Cambridge, Massachusetts 1996, pp.435–39.<br/>Sloan Rankin, ‘Peach Mumble – Ideas Cooking’ in Hervé Chandès (ed.), <i>Francesca Woodman</i>, New York 1998.<br/>Harriet Riches, ‘A Disappearing Act: Francesca Woodman’s <i>Portrait of a Reputation</i>’, <i>Oxford Art Journal</i>, vol.27, no.1, 2004, pp.97–113.</p>
<p>John White<br/>University of Edinburgh<br/>January 2015</p>
<p>
<i>The University of Edinburgh is a research partner of ARTIST ROOMS.</i>
</p>
</div>

Summary
2019-07-09T00:00:00
summary
SHORT_TEXT
<p>The bodies of the two naked women in this photograph are cropped and decentred; Woodman treats them with no more importance than the scattered objects that surround them. Here Woodman uses a mirror as a prop – it becomes a symbol of artistic self-reflexivity, reflecting the ‘eye’ of the camera back upon itself. Her photographs explore issues of gender and self, looking at the representation of the body in relation to its surroundings. They are not conventional portraits, since figures are either partially hidden or concealed by slow exposures that blur them into surreal, ghostly forms. This underlying fragility is emphasised by the small and intimate format of the photographs.</p>

Online caption
2009-04-16T00:00:00
online-caption
ONLINE_CAPTION
actions: postures and motions adults book - non-specific document - non-specific emotions, concepts and ideas female formal qualities furnishings interiors mirror named individuals natural phenomena nudes objects people photographic portraits reading, writing, printed matter reflection self-portraits sitting standing studio woman Woodman, Francesca workspaces