Date of Award
Spring 5-18-2018
Degree Name
Master of Fine Arts (MFA) in Visual Art
Degree Type
Thesis
Abstract
I make work in a variety of media, largely dealing with the imagery and material of the human body. My current work attempts to reckon with the following subjects: a reclamation of the notion of the so-called medical gaze and its historical record in photography; the idea that receiving the medical gaze transforms patients’ bodies; the idea of illness as an uncanny and intimate experience; and, finally, the act of metaphorically retracing the body’s material journey through the medical institution as it exists today. In this text, I discuss my practice in the context of critical theory, a recent observation of surgery, and my own family history of illness. In my practice, I find, make, and remake images of fragile bodies. When I do not photograph or construct these bodies myself, I appropriate images from various collections, public and private, of the Western archives of medical photography. My most recent work shades blue and violet what once existed in sepia and grayscale. Through the gesture of drawing, my work attempts to symbolically rebury medicalized bodies exposed by the archive. The goal of my work is to transform these scenes of disease, control, and physical holding between patients and caregivers – often so othered by age – from spaces to be looked at, to spaces the viewer must look into.
Language
English (en)
Program Director
Patricia Olynyk
Program Director's Department
Graduate School of Art
Thesis Advisor
Monika Weiss
Studio/Primary Advisor
Monika Weiss
Studio/Primary Advisor
Richard Krueger
Committee Member
Jamie Adams
Committee Member
Jamie Adams
Recommended Citation
Fergeson, Cecily Ann, "Four Sights of the Patient (Ophelia)" (2018). Graduate School of Art Theses. ETD 101. https://doi.org/10.7936/K73N22T2.
https://openscholarship.wustl.edu/samfox_art_etds/101
Included in
Art Practice Commons, Bioethics and Medical Ethics Commons, Feminist Philosophy Commons, Medical Humanities Commons, Painting Commons, Photography Commons, Theory and Criticism Commons
Artist's Statement
I make work in a variety of media including photography, drawing, painting, and installation. My work largely deals with the imagery and material of the human body. My current work attempts to reckon with the following subjects: a reclamation of the notion of the so-called medical gaze and its historical record in photography; the idea that receiving the medical gaze transforms patients’ bodies; the idea of illness as an uncanny and intimate experience; and, finally, the act of metaphorically retracing the body’s material journey through the medical institution as it exists today.
Permanent URL: https://doi.org/10.7936/K73N22T2