Narcissus
Maclain P.
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In the original Greek myth, Narcissus is a man who is so vain that he falls in love with his own reflection. Unable to stop looking at himself, he wastes away and turns into a flower, becoming a cautionary tale of the dangers of self-obsession.
In my piece, I wanted to reappropriate this narrative into a modern feminist context. I painted a woman trapped in a prism made of mirrors, her face blurred and obscured by a narcissus flower. This version of Narcissus is forced into self-obsession, constantly being bombarded with her own image and having no choice but to examine herself infinitely. In performing this obsessive self-voyeurism, her sense of identity starts to disappear. She becomes indistinguishable from her reflection; she only exists as a nebulous feminine form, a collection of other people’s perceptions. My aim was to represent the intrinsic sense of constant surveillance present in the modern female experience.
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Though I have a deep love of writing and the English language, I believe that visual art can often provide nuance and depth to my ideas and experiences that words can not. Art is a mechanism through which I can share my voice, challenging long standing power structures and making necessary change.
