Fragility, Mortality, and Emptiness: Animal Fiber as Sculptural Material in Contemporary Art

Abstract

Born out of the performance art of the 1960s, which focused on the artist's body as an artistic medium, artists and curators of the last three decades have looked to skin as a manipulative material and metaphor for art making. This paper analyzes the work of three contemporary artists who are working in a subcategory of the movement to work with concepts of skin. Doris Salcedo, Janine Antoni, and Sonya Kelliher-Combs, each from a unique and distinct historical, geographical, and cultural moment, use animal fibers to address issues of fragility, mortality, and emptiness through the violences rooted in their respective moments. Because of the similarities of themes in these works, despite their differing locations, this paper argues the importance of the use of material from a slaughtered animal to convey ideas of violence. Further, by situating these artists in their contemporary setting and comparing them to other artists working in similar ways, they are continuing the momentum of the performance art movement while reacting against ready-made or industrial materials to remind the viewer of their disconnect from animals in their highly manufactured western culture. By using these once-living materials, these artists are employing Julia Kristeva's discussion of the abject and the Derridean concept of the trace as interpreted by Mieke Bal, which this paper aims to illustrate.