Broken Figure
Eileen Quinlan
2014
- Medium
- Gelatin silver print
- Dimensions
- 76.2 × 61 cm (30 × 24 in.)
- Genre
- photography
- Museum
- Art Institute of Chicago
Styles
Tags
black and whitephotographic materialsfigrefigures (representations)21st Centuryphotographygelatin silver printportraits: female subjectblack-and-white photographyportraits: self-portraitpeoplephotographphotographic imagescontemporarybodyphotographic processperson
About
In this series of photographs, Eileen Quinlan reflected on motherhood. Snatching brief moments in between the demands of maternity, she sequestered herself in the shower and used this small space for contemplation. Pressing her body and that of a friend against the glass, Quinlan made nude photographs with obsolete black-and-white Polaroid film. The images blur and distort their subjects because Quinlan squeezed and manipulated the Polaroid’s developing fluid. The results conflate the surfaces of the body, the glass door, and the photographic material in a complex layering that frustrates our gaze.
