Wanted: Your Words

I am working on a new art project and, this August,  I need the help of other women.

I paint with lipstick. It’s a medium that is intimately associated with the female body, and with the way in which woman see themselves. Lipstick is frequently a synecdoche of what is dismissed as feminine vanity and because, in this case, the medium is the message, I want to explore that.

Usually my paintings feature words as well as images  – either text supplied by the person commissioning it, or my own thoughts on a subject. My next painting is for a Women’s Month supplement, and I would like to include the words of many women in it, not just my own.

This is how you can help.

1. Think about your relationship with your own body.  How do you feel when you look at yourself in a mirror? How do you feel about yourself when you try to take a selfie?

2. Sum your feelings up in a tweet.

3. Tag it #SaartjieSelfie

I’ll take the #SaartjieSelfie tweets over the next three days and write them into the painting before photographing it and sending in the image for publication.

I’ll let you know when it is published, and in the mean time, I’ll tell you more about the story behind the painting in the next couple of posts on my site.