Artwork

Breasts in the Press / Julia Cahill

2012
Digital image IRC.2013.04219 showing Julia Cahill's installation, Breasts in the Press, at the Mattress Factory, 2012.
Views
Identifier

IWC.20

Materials

video and audio; fiberglass, epoxy and Bondo

Description
Julia Cahill graduated from the BFA program at Carnegie Mellon University in summer 2012. I was pleased to have a very young artist in this exhibition, as my experience from teaching is that feminist thinking is invigorating and empowering to you women as they discover its relevance to their own lives. Although I say to my students that I'm more concerned that they can articulate their own positions than that they say they are feminists, it is exciting to see that 'aha!' moment, a light turning out, that means they will always from that point forward understand things differently. Cahill had already passed that moment when I met her, and was acknowledging her indebtedness to artworks from the 1970s by American feminist artists. - Hilary Robinson, Curator

[This piece] should be viewed as a humorous approach to a very serious subject. And in a way it is not just a piece of art. For me, if anything that is secondary - I think it is firstly a political action, to not only make other people aware of things, but to say "let's think of something, let's think of a way to change this." As an artist a big thing is that you can ask questions, you don't have to answer them, and I'm just posing questions like, "Is this really how we want to keep on viewing women's breasts and how are we going to change that?" So it is leaving it up to the audience to say: "Oh, okay, here's the questions - I can try to answer it." I don't want to give answers because I don't really have many answers, only my own personal ones.
About the Artist

Julia Cahill is an artist whose work in performance, video, and installation comments — through exaggeration and satire — on the sexual imagery and exploitation prevalent in media today. She received her BFA from Carnegie Mellon University and has exhibited in the Pittsburgh area. 
September 7, 2012 – May 26, 2013