Untitled Film Still #1 1977

Curator: Look at her; she seems caught mid-thought, like we’ve walked in on her most private moment, or perhaps before she's ready to appear on set. Editor: Exactly! It is part of Cindy Sherman’s “Untitled Film Still #1” created in 1977. Sherman herself plays the part of this woman, of course, and, through a series of such photographs, investigates stereotypical representations of women in film. Curator: She’s looking away; the shadows are so incredibly placed, and yet I feel there's a story I should know, or already *do* know… a familiar face from cinema. Editor: It's interesting that the ‘familiarity’ is precisely Sherman’s intention; to play on readily available images and narratives about women. Here, in this gelatin-silver print, the setting almost screams of domestic confinement, whilst the woman seems to anticipate an encounter or a confrontation. This reading opens to gendered experience and its representation. Curator: Right! She’s holding her glasses; is it a signal that, when she wears them, she must project this outward vision? A different person altogether? Editor: Perhaps it could be interpreted like that. The glasses are ambiguous props, really. We're all so deeply trained to view women through lenses created by film, photography, television, you name it… I guess that this photograph confronts those frameworks, asking us to question them. Curator: She’s so convincingly *ordinary* in the shot, not made up, the angle so neutral, it looks like an un-retouched paparazzi snap. It’s all so real, I keep waiting for the scene to continue and she will suddenly put the glasses on and stare straight into my eyes… but, it will never happen, this scene will never take place, and, strangely, I am completely OK with that. Editor: Precisely. This tension between reality and artifice is, perhaps, her core commentary. What are the layers we inhabit as people who consume images, but who are also inevitably and unconsciously *consumed* by them? Food for thought… or for action? Curator: Certainly action! That quiet sense of defiance is so contagious. It seems almost rebellious and liberating. It invites a deep breath and encourages a shake-off of whatever outdated story we were meant to act out, inviting us into our authentic persona. Editor: Right, it makes you consider your position within it all and invites action as you stated.