A&E
Stout blends female mystic with reality
By Xenia Tiajolof ’16
October 8, 2015
Renée Stout’s work does not comment on a theme that is new to any avid reader of American literature, or to many enthusiasts of spiritual and feminist work. However, what sets Stout’s work apart from other art that incorporates the thematic image of a sexually empowered female mystic is her success in creating a believability to her mystic’s reality as well as her impeccable technical achievement. In such a sublime a manner does Stout execute her vision that when one stands before the work, he does not question the honesty of the image present before him. Despite the range in mediums, including paintings inspired by graphic design, or complex assemblages (a grouping of found or unrelated objects), each is unquestionably a part of the same universe.
The art is so fully an extension of Fatima, the invented conjure woman who Stout embodies as her conduit for opinions on relationships, economics, societal pressures and the presence and importance of the spiritual world. The border between artist and alter ego blurs so much so that Stout embodies the conjure women in her text, her image and her atmosphere: the artist’s purpose being a physical manifestation of her perception and reclamation of the forgotten spirituality of African American culture through Fatima’s environment.
I was walking through the exhibition with Jim Larson ’17 for a duration of the opening and he described the works as well crafted “counterfeits of a fantastic culture.” The fantastical culture Stout paints and builds is so believable that we understand the work not as pieces Stout created, but rather as objects Fatima interacts with in her world—a culture we cannot help but feel is real. We know these objects to be affected and altered by Stout, and yet we cannot help but resonate with an authenticity that emanates from the work.
“The Root Dispenser” is one example of extreme genuineness in the imagined. The viewer is greeted with a reasonably recognizable object, with a distinction of age in its design and weather rusted appearance, but upon closer interaction with the dispenser, its specialized function becomes apparent. It is easy to imagine the object on the wall of a conjure woman’s shop. The herbs in the dispenser evoke images of medicinal applications as well as otherworldly exercise. Amazingly, our brains accept this technology to be legitimate, because why wouldn’t the technologies in our reality also find use in the world of the unearthly?
In my opinion, some of the most quietly effective lynchpins of the show were the photographs. With photography there is an understanding that an artist can only capture on film that which truly exists. By photographing and juxtaposing the image of bottles of herbs in “Dreams Come True” with images of streets in “Marie Laveau,” Stout once again blurs the lines of our reality and believed reality. If we see it presented in a photograph, Fatima’s world must be true. Her herbs must be real, and so must be her palm reading and her magic. In the time lapse photograph “New Orleans,” Fatima is pictured nude, strong, wild and trapped between the spiritual realm and the physical realm. The green coloring of the wall and antique feeling of atmosphere add a quality of the occult as well. Here she reclaims standards of African American beauty, strength, femininity and sexuality, along with the image and environmental realism of the spiritual and metaphysical in one photograph. Her beauty is tied to her sense of power, her mysticism and her female body.
Stout’s exhibition is one that weighs so heavily on thematics and symbolism that one only wants to discuss in further detail and in length. Rooted deeply in the same energy of reclamation she believes was existent in the Civil Rights Movement, Stout dares us to find the fantasy in her work. When we deem it an impossible mission, then we realize that there is no distinction between the representation of female strength, African American culture and the metaphysical. If you leave the exhibition without feeling a newfound rejuvenation in your belief in the spiritual realm, you did not invest yourself properly in the art.