We went out on the streets dressed in trench coats, with our 'muff' wigs. We stood outside Oxford Circus and began to talk to the public using megaphones, asking them if they wanted new hands or new hymens and pretended to inject each other using large needles labeled botox, We Selfridges shopping bags labeled 'Are you losing yourself?', 'Where is yourself?', 'New Hands' and 'New Hymens'. We wrote on each others bodies a series of questions and comments in relation a woman's body as a literal construct. At times we flashed our muff wigs.
Why? I hear you ask. It was partly an instinctive and impulsive reaction to sexualized images that we have absorbed as young girls, now as adults we want to find a way to comment on the stereotypical images of women in the media. We feel that the extent to which this has accelerated since
we were teenagers is astonishing. It is also frustrating that this has become so normalized within our culture. We feel that on mass it has become almost unquestioned and to question it provokes a 'Who cares?' or 'It's a woman's choice?' Well, The Muffia want to say: 'We care' and that we wonder what choice actually means in our society. What are our choices based upon?
There are countries in which women face torture and oppressions to an extent which we cannot comprehend. We feel torn and frustrated at times that our issues are about the body and the media but we feel as women we HAVE to react. The body is political. Daily maintenance, beauty regimes, surgery, enhancement and using chemicals could be seen as torture and oppressive from an alien's viewpoint.
What we do is try to stimulate debate, express ourselves as human beings (when we are often told not to by society) and most of all make changes. Our methods, our performances are varied and at times extreme.
We feel right now, they have to be.
Flashing our fake muff hair, asking people questions, acting like monkeys, dancing in the street might not change the world but it might aid one person to change their perception, their obsession with their body. It has also caused debate, which means exchanging information.
Why? I hear you ask. It was partly an instinctive and impulsive reaction to sexualized images that we have absorbed as young girls, now as adults we want to find a way to comment on the stereotypical images of women in the media. We feel that the extent to which this has accelerated since
we were teenagers is astonishing. It is also frustrating that this has become so normalized within our culture. We feel that on mass it has become almost unquestioned and to question it provokes a 'Who cares?' or 'It's a woman's choice?' Well, The Muffia want to say: 'We care' and that we wonder what choice actually means in our society. What are our choices based upon?There are countries in which women face torture and oppressions to an extent which we cannot comprehend. We feel torn and frustrated at times that our issues are about the body and the media but we feel as women we HAVE to react. The body is political. Daily maintenance, beauty regimes, surgery, enhancement and using chemicals could be seen as torture and oppressive from an alien's viewpoint.
What we do is try to stimulate debate, express ourselves as human beings (when we are often told not to by society) and most of all make changes. Our methods, our performances are varied and at times extreme.
We feel right now, they have to be.
Flashing our fake muff hair, asking people questions, acting like monkeys, dancing in the street might not change the world but it might aid one person to change their perception, their obsession with their body. It has also caused debate, which means exchanging information.