The ongoing project ‘A(n)namorphosis’ deals with a female perspective on the male gaze on female bodies. It was created as a reaction to the decontextualization and consequent misinterpretation of my previous work ‘Anna Konda’, named after the founder of a Female Fight Club in Berlin.
To this day, the photo series of the fighting women, which has been exhibited and published internationally, has constantly been accompanied by recipients either questioning the fighters’ femininity or framing them as pornographic material. A perception that was neither intended nor expected, but ultimately led to a visual experimentation with the so-called ‘male gaze’, my own gaze and the viewers gaze.
The project ‘A(n)namorphosis’ has its origin in the predominantly male fan community that has formed around the female fighters, but in time expanded to a broader reflection on hierarchies of gaze.
The work aims at visual deconstruction of masculinity and femininity, which are ultimately a social construction. It is an attempt to appropriate the gender-biased power relations that exist in between. It is a possible response to the many moments, looks, comments that make our self-assertion as women* a constant struggle. The images – one could also say chimeras – represent a play with identities and mimetic desire. It is my reflection on how it feels to be the object of the gaze which I return: I see you seeing me.