Untitled #417 2004

Curator: Cindy Sherman's "Untitled #417," from 2004. It's a photograph, a self-portrait actually, featuring Sherman as a clown. The makeup is heavy, almost theatrical, and the background is this wild, swirly pattern. Editor: It definitely has an unsettling feel to it. The clown makeup, usually associated with joy, feels kind of… sinister. What do you see in this piece? Curator: Sherman is, as always, intensely interested in the constructed nature of identity. How do the materials of this photograph – the wig, the makeup, the very staging of the shot – build a character? The clown is not a neutral figure. Think about the history of clowning, the cultural anxieties they represent. Are we seeing a commentary on the commodification of emotions? On the performed labor of making people laugh, or be scared? Editor: So, you're saying it’s less about Sherman expressing herself, and more about her using materials – literally makeup and wigs, but also culturally loaded symbols like the clown – to dissect how identities are fabricated and consumed? Curator: Exactly. Consider the sheer volume of photographs produced and consumed daily. What is Sherman doing by inserting herself into that economy? Is she producing another image to be consumed, or critiquing the whole process of image-making itself? Think about the costuming; is it cheaply made? How does that play into ideas of class and consumption? Editor: That makes me think about the multiple figures, as well as how the gaudy backdrop interacts with the character itself to challenge traditional notions of "high art" photography and instead examines these pieces as commodities or cultural signifiers. Curator: Precisely. Editor: That's a really helpful perspective. I was focused on the individual portrait, but thinking about it as a construction of materials within a specific economic context opens up a whole new way of seeing it. Curator: It shows us that art is not separate from the material conditions of its production and consumption.