Lot 37

The work is in good condition overall. In the lower left corner, there is a small dark surface mark. The lower right corner displays very minor surface marks.
The work is stretched with no additional frame.


The opinions expressed in the condition reports are a guide only and should not be treated as a statement of fact. Prospective buyers are encouraged to inspect articles for sale at our pre-sale viewing where Leonard Joel staff are available for advice.
Leonard Joel makes no guarantee of the originality of mechanical or applied components. Absence of reference to such modifications does not imply that a lot is free from modifications.

The Big Pin-Ups series was first conceived in early 2010. I had wanted to paint portraits of a few 'adult' performers I knew, but had resisted, mainly because I wanted to do them in a way that was credible - read 'politically correct' - as serious art. 

Then a friend lent me a copy of David Bailey's A Box of Pin-Ups. A collection of black and white portraits from the early Sixties, Bailey's monograph featured everyone from the infamous Kray brothers to a young Mick Jagger and the world's first supermodel (and Bailey's then girlfriend), Jean Shrimpton. It made me realise that any attempt to sanitise my acquaintances would betray the essentially alternative, subversive self-regard I loved most about them. They were all smart, sexy and larger-than-life and they had made it 'big' in the multi-billion enterprise entertainment industry we refer to as porn. 

I re-conceived the portraits as a set of shiny 'pin-ups'. Big - so big the figures loom over the viewer - and noxiously pretty, painted in high-gloss enamel with strong, simple lines and pretty, girlish hues, the surface of each has to be as sleek, idealised and sultry as the screen persona of each of the subjects. Adhering to a long-established convention, I painted a Miss for every month, a series of 12 in all, each in a different pose and with different dimensions. None were sexually graphic. I resisted giving the series a title that would offer an ironic wink to those looking for deeper intellectual substance. They were simply Big Pin-Ups. Nothing more - but nothing less, either. 

Big Pin-Up: Miss March is as much a portrait of a vulnerable, self-aware woman as it is of a sexually desirable one. Early feminism argued that women should oppose all exploitation of their bodies. But contemporary feminists knows better: we objectify and exploit ourselves - physically, sexually and intellectually - on our own terms. We reap the rewards, along with the reproof.
Hazel Dooney



© Hazel Dooney