Sarah Lucas

SARAH LUCAS

SOMETHING FISHY

Lucas' works are about sex or sexuality in relation to the male and female body, as presented in words and pictures in our contemporary culture. Her works are an ambiguous mix of a moral stance and a genuine fascination.

Got a Salmon On in the street #3, 2001

Description
Self-portrait of the artist. Standing in a street Lucas is holding a large photograph of a naked male torso in front of herself. The man is covering his crotch with a beer can which squirts as he opens it.

Lucas is dressed in sturdy boots, denims and a dark jacket, her back to a red brick wall, meeting the onlooker's gaze. The pavement looks scruffy as does the wall which might be an old factory building or the like. The urban locale may be expressionless but neutral it isn't.
The photograph is slightly shaken and out of focus.

What is the work about
In a large number of self-portraits Sarah Lucas has challenged sexual stereotypes and gender representations. She depicts herself deliberately androgynously, wearing heavy boots, denims and t-shirts and in addition her poses are more masculine than feminine.
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Lucas' art in general
Sarah Lucas often employs metaphors that represent or symbolise sexual body parts. These metaphors are frequently food or furniture which she utilises as ready-mades, attributing new meanings to them. She detourns the original significance of the before so innocent food, resulting in crude and often overtly sexual connotations.

Lucas' exploration of the relationship between word and image is an art historical parallel to the conceptual art of the 1960s and 1970s.
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Literature
"Sarah Lucas" (Matthew Collings), Tate Publishings, London, 2002