Items Similar to Passed Out
Want more images or videos?
Request additional images or videos from the seller
1 of 7
Dina GoldsteinPassed Out2012
2012
About the Item
At last! The veil has been lifted on Barbie’s emotional distress and Ken’s genuine sexual interests. In her photographic series In the Dollhouse, Vancouver-based artist Dina Goldstein chronicles the unhappy marriage of the two most iconic, played-with, and, some would say, socially problematic dolls ever designed. Through her ten-part story, she peeks into the private life of the couple, dismantling the sacred aura surrounding these symbols of popular visual culture.
In the late 1980s, picking up on the claim of Simone de Beauvoir and Maurice Merleau-Ponty that the body is a historically contingent site of meaning, feminist theorist Judith Butler offered a reconceptualisation of gender as a “corporeal style,” the cultural and performative interpretation of the facticity of the body. Furthermore, Butler argued, if gender performance eventually leads to the sedimentation of the roles ascribed to biological sexes, then “performing one’s gender wrong initiates a set of punishments both obvious and indirect.”
It is with the possibility and implications of subverting “sedimented” gender behaviour that Goldstein is primarily concerned in the Dollhouse. Surprisingly (and, hilariously) enough, what we see is a transgender Ken reading The Oprah Magazine, wearing Barbie’s stilettos, and leg shaving in the bath. Devastated by the news of her husband’s gay affair, we later find Barbie shifting to a boyish appearance by cutting her iconic hair and putting on a suit and tie.
What is especially noteworthy about the proposed articulation of gender roles is precisely the use of Barbie and Ken, as they have continuously embodied the epitome of popular gender expectations throughout their fifty years of imposed partnership. Thus, just as we slowly realize that the subjects of the photographs are not really plastic toys, the Dollhouse series becomes a site where behavioural expectations flicker and traditional gender roles are reshaped in creative ways.
And yet, as we encounter Barbie’s despair, we are just as much encouraged to reflect upon the implications of “performing one’s gender wrong,” upon what we need to sacrifice in order to give way to something new. In the Dollhouse is also, more broadly, a questioning of the (anachronistic?) place of marriage as an institution in our contemporary period, as well as of the value we place on beauty and the weight that it carries “within the interior walls of our lives.”
- Creator:Dina Goldstein (1969, Israeli)
- Creation Year:2012
- Dimensions:Height: 48 in (121.92 cm)Width: 61 in (154.94 cm)Depth: 2 in (5.08 cm)
- Medium:
- Movement & Style:
- Period:
- Condition:
- Gallery Location:Montreal, CA
- Reference Number:1stDibs: LU476123596
About the Seller
5.0
Vetted Seller
These experienced sellers undergo a comprehensive evaluation by our team of in-house experts.
Established in 1996
1stDibs seller since 2014
96 sales on 1stDibs
- ShippingRetrieving quote...Ships From: Montreal, Canada
- Return PolicyA return for this item may be initiated within 7 days of delivery.
More From This SellerView All
- for intérieur – braise 3By Patrick BeaulieuLocated in Montreal, QuebecPatrick Beaulieu’s multi-disciplined practice creates finely tuned and subtle gestures that aim to re-focus our attention on the physical world that we see and experience. In convers...Category
21st Century and Contemporary Contemporary Abstract Photography
MaterialsPhotographic Paper
- for intérieur – braise 4By Patrick BeaulieuLocated in Montreal, QuebecPatrick Beaulieu’s multi-disciplined practice creates finely tuned and subtle gestures that aim to re-focus our attention on the physical world that we see and experience. In convers...Category
21st Century and Contemporary Contemporary Abstract Photography
MaterialsPhotographic Paper
- for intérieur – sang 2By Patrick BeaulieuLocated in Montreal, QuebecPatrick Beaulieu’s multi-disciplined practice creates finely tuned and subtle gestures that aim to re-focus our attention on the physical world that we see and experience. In convers...Category
21st Century and Contemporary Contemporary Still-life Photography
MaterialsPhotographic Paper
- for intérieur – braise 1By Patrick BeaulieuLocated in Montreal, QuebecPatrick Beaulieu’s multi-disciplined practice creates finely tuned and subtle gestures that aim to re-focus our attention on the physical world that we see and experience. In convers...Category
21st Century and Contemporary Contemporary Abstract Photography
MaterialsPhotographic Paper
- for intérieur – braise 2By Patrick BeaulieuLocated in Montreal, QuebecPatrick Beaulieu’s multi-disciplined practice creates finely tuned and subtle gestures that aim to re-focus our attention on the physical world that we see and experience. In convers...Category
21st Century and Contemporary Contemporary Abstract Photography
MaterialsPhotographic Paper
- You Should Have Seen What I’ve SeenBy Henri VenneLocated in Montreal, QuebecMy work emerges from research on memory and the remembrance of landscape, where vaporous atmospheres of evanescent recollections are illustrated. My work thus, contains ghostly and e...Category
2010s Contemporary Abstract Photography
MaterialsPlexiglass, Photographic Paper
You May Also Like
- Eli Freiman, News, Photograph, c-print on Diasec, 100x155 cmBy Eli FreimanLocated in Jerusalem, ILEli Freiman News, 2020 Photograph, c-print on Diasec 150x100 cm ed. 6 Eli Freiman, born in Israel in 1960, is the son of renowned Jerusalem artist and sil...Category
2010s Contemporary Abstract Photography
MaterialsPlexiglass, Photographic Paper
- Eli Freiman, Birds, Photograph, c-print on Diasec, 100x155 cmBy Eli FreimanLocated in Jerusalem, ILEli Freiman Birds, 2020 Photograph, c-print on Diasec 100x155 cm ed. 6 Eli Freiman, born in Israel in 1960, is the son of renowned Jerusalem artist and si...Category
2010s Contemporary Abstract Photography
MaterialsPlexiglass, Photographic Paper
- Eli Freiman, Shalom Tower, Photograph, c-print on Diasec, 100x150 cmBy Eli FreimanLocated in Jerusalem, ILEli Freiman Shalom Tower, 2020 Photograph, c-print on Diasec 100x150 cm ed. 6 Eli Freiman, born in Israel in 1960, is the son of renowned Jerusalem artist...Category
2010s Contemporary Abstract Photography
MaterialsPlexiglass, Photographic Paper
- Eli Freiman, Abstract Urban Landscape, Photograph, c-print on Diasec, 100x150 cmBy Eli FreimanLocated in Jerusalem, ILEli Freiman Abstract Urban Landscape, 2020 Photograph, c-print on Diasec 100x150 cm ed. 6 Eli Freiman, born in Israel in 1960, is the son of renowned Jeru...Category
2010s Contemporary Abstract Photography
MaterialsPlexiglass, Photographic Paper
- Eli Freiman, Autumn, Photograph, c-print on Diasec, 100x155 cmBy Eli FreimanLocated in Jerusalem, ILEli Freiman Autumn, 2020 Photograph, c-print on Diasec 100x155 cm ed. 6 Eli Freiman, born in Israel in 1960, is the son of renowned Jerusalem artist and s...Category
2010s Contemporary Abstract Photography
MaterialsPlexiglass, Photographic Paper
- Dot Connector - Cyanotype Style Film Photographic Print FramedBy Pia ClodiLocated in Salzburg, ATNot one to shy away from human representation, Pia Clodi’s more portraiture-like works continually offer the sitter an air of anonymity, and as such the viewer has the opportunity to...Category
21st Century and Contemporary Contemporary Figurative Photography
MaterialsPhotographic Film, Photographic Paper, Carbon Pigment, Polaroid