The truth won't save you now

Self portraits can be both the most honest and dishonest portraits one could take.

They are dishonest in the sense that, unlike with any other portrait, the artist is unable to view the subject at the moment of creation. The artist invites you to see a her she has never seen, except along side you as spectator viewing a photograph, but not as photographer looking through the viewfinder at the precise moment when time is being frozen.

Of course, they are honest in the sense that they are the most pure creation the artist could make. She invites us to see her in her precise moment of becoming as artist--to see all that she has choreographed, directed, posed, lit and framed into her creation of herself as artist. Thus we have not just a portrait of the artist, but a portrait of the artist in creation.

This paradox of honesty/dishonesty can be reframed as the tension between signifier and signified, a topic that has dominated philosophy since before Socrates and that heated up dramatically in the late 20th century. To make a very long story very short, for me the quality of any self-portrait, beyond its technical considerations, lies in just how much the artist embraces her role as signifier, as the materiality of expression, if you like. In "The truth won't save you now," we have an example of an artist doing this brilliantly and to great effect.

In a metaphorical yet still very material sense, Halohid becomes her own canvas in this photo. Notice how the minimal contrast between her body and the walls and floors of the room tends to make her one with the asylum. Her skin is whitest in front of where the background is whitest (the far wall and door), and in shadow and therefore darkest when it appears in front of the darker tonality of the floor.

This effect creates a sense of profound empathy between the artist and the scene of the mental asylum, as she almost seems to merge into it. The the placement of her hands and the rope tied around her further refine this artistic empathy.

Covering her eyes, nose and mouth, her hands demonstrate the complete depersonalization and dehumanization of the asylum patient. Either her surroundings are so bleak she's driven to protect herself by cutting off all sensation, or perhaps the way she is swallowed into one with the asylum takes her ability to perceive anything away.

Notice how the rope wrapped around her body binds her legs together tightly just below the waist, while she has more freedom of movement with how her hands are tied.

I don't know any of the history of Aradale Mental Asylum, but for me this evokes the way during the Victorian period female orgasm was viewed as, and treated as, a form of mental hysteria. The woman here is allowed no sexual identity, and only enough freedom to be able to silence herself. Her "treatment" in the asylum is the elimination of all that makes her a woman, and all that makes her able to perceive, understand and express--all that makes her an artist.

In an extreme act of artistic empathy and creation, Halohid identifies herself with the victim/patient of the asylum. It is the power of her art that, in so doing, she awakens what was silenced, blinded, made barren and repressed.

It is literally the materiality of her body that brings to life the story of the asylum. And as self portrait, the photo also brings to light the tremendous insight, understanding and expressive capability of one highly talented photographer and model.

Wonderful achievement.