ARTISTS STATEMENT
I work with complexities of contemporary feminisms through a variety of visual mediums. In 2019 I photographed 100 women in iconic, statuesque poses as both messengers and a message of collective empowerment. Several of my subjects were pregnant. I was moved by how their dignity, strength, and introspection came through the camera. The original images were printed larger than life, but I find them equally powerful and talismanic at a smaller scale.
ABOUT THE ARTIST
Ginny Sykes is an interdisciplinary artist inspired by mythology, Jungian psychology, and ancient monuments. She has participated in residencies, festivals and exhibitions in Italy, Bulgaria, Spain, Italy, Germany, Sweden, and Mexico, and the United States. Sykes has collaborated with Le Nemesiache, a transfeminist movement begun in Italy in the 1970s, and is a founding member of Feministas Futuristicas, a collaborative feminist collective with participants from seven countries. Throughout these partnerships and across all genres of her practice, she employs a poetic, layered aesthetic, to invite a consideration of the transforming and healing potential of art, and to encourage access to one’s inner world. Sykes has presented her work at the Jungian Institute International Conference and at the College Art Association Conference. She taught at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and in many community based art programs and has created over 40 public art projects, including On the Wings of Water at O’Hare Airport. Sykes holds an MA in Women Studies and Gender Studies from Loyola University, Chicago, IL, a BFA from Washington University, Saint Louis, Missouri, and studied painting and art history at Studio Cecil Graves in Florence, Italy. She divides her working life between Chicago and Naples Italy.
© Ginny Sykes