Presenter: Alexa Beck
Mentor: Alex Krajkowski, Art Psychology
Creative Work Project: C9 (Ballroom)
Major: Psychology
Our present culture consists of the sexually liberated man and the only-when-appropriate sexually liberated woman. Men can be both wholesome and sexual while women have to choose between the two and if she is both she has to hide her sexual side. Through a compilation of large photographs, I will expose a hidden side of female sexuality that many choose to believe doesn’t exist: women’s sexual desires and female orgasms. In a lecture called Coming to Understand: Orgasm and the Epistemology of Ignorance, Nancy Tuana revealed that 30% of women engaged in sexual activities are preorgasmic meaning that they have never achieved an orgasm. Therefore, she recommends that women masturbate because, compared to 75% of men, only 1/3 of women regularly achieve an orgasm from partnered sex. This current body of work was meant to be a distant relative of Hannah Altman’s “And Everything Nice.” In Altman’s piece, she captures the glorification of all women’s constant need to be beautiful, in every context. The social stigma of this continuous beauty inspired the social stigma within women’s sexuality and its limitations. This work intersects with Altman’s work in that they both are meant to make the audience question the way they view women, in various circumstances. The base of this creative work and representation of these ideas are showcased through the virgin-whore dichotomy. The two opposing concepts come together over the same main point about women’s sexuality and masturbation. Women are just becoming known for their own sexuality and they need to own it. Women and men are supposed to be equal so women should be enjoying sex as much as men, right?