Creative Sites of Resistance: imagined futures is a new collaborative project by artist-researcher Jody Haines. The social portrait project for women, by women* was created during Jody’s time as an artist-researcher-in-residence at RMIT PlaceLab Brunswick from 17th-28th October.
*female-identifying, trans and non-binary persons
Creative Sites of Resistance recognises a significant and persistent problem in the way that women are visually represented in our public spaces. The differing expectations around gender and appearance are clear when you scroll through social media or watch the news. Consider the example of people in positions of authority and power. A recent Pew Research Centre study found that men appear twice as often as women in news images, with a majority of photos showing exclusively men, and a study of the stock exchange in New Zealand found that men were often pictured in higher positions and encompassed more space within the frame. This dominance also exists behind the lens. Photography is a stubbornly male-dominated field, despite women being early pioneers. So, perhaps the problem can be summarised like this: when it comes to positions of power and authority, we see more men, more of men, and more images by men.
