ABSTRACT
As dieting skyrocketed in the 1970s and aerobics entered the mainstream in the 1980s, logically, artists began to incorporate these topics into their artwork. Through a careful study of select artworks, the problematic nature of making their bodies part of the artistic endeavor emerges. Performance and documentation play a key role in these projects, making physical and concrete the effects and efforts that go along with altering the shape of the physique. In her performances Charm (1977) and The Death Show (1978), Rosenthal dramatically tells her personal stories of overeating and how she was able to achieve weight loss. Ringgold also tells her stories in performance but specializes in quilts, the first and best known being Change: Faith Ringgold’s Over 100 Weight Loss Story Quilt (1986). More recently, Julia Kozerski and Jen Davis have extensively documented their respective massive weight losses. In Half (2009–2012), Kozerski shows the effects that losing half of her body weight has had on her body—stretch marks included. This 160-pound weight loss was further documented in Changing Room (2009–2012), which was a series of camera phone pictures taken in dressing rooms throughout the time she was making this huge change in her life. Jen Davis explored similar issues in Eleven Years (2014, begun in 2002). Continuing to make these types of images after having a lap band surgery to help her lose weight, her work brings up some of the same issues as Kozerski. Each of these artists heavily rely on the before-and-after format, demonstrating their successes, and yet although these artworks document each of these artists’ success at losing weight, is it possible to see them as critiquing the diet and/or exercise industry? Ultimately, these artworks are too inwardly focused to allow any type of sustained challenge to societal perceptions of the female body.
