Analysis: Abramovic, Kahlo, and Xiuwen

These three artists are women from very different backgrounds - Marina Abramovic is from Yugoslavia, Frida Kahlo from Mexico, and Cui Xiuwen from China - yet they all display a similar portrayal of women. Each artist concerns herself with depicting women in untypical circumstances, whether it be an uncommon role for women, an unusual setting, or a hidden side of the female psyche. Abramovic, Kahlo, and Xiuwen all use surreal subject matter to convey their messages about women.

Marina Abramovic: Abramovic’s pieces are all distinctly hers; not only because her body of work is nearly entirely comprised of self-portraits, but because she has a recognizable style. Compositionally, the majority of her pieces are centered, and relatively symmetrical. She carefully crafts each scene she captures, precisely placing every object in the composition, and leaving no detail to chance. Most of her pieces concern discomfort, or a feeling of being out of place. Abramovic portrays a woman who is uninterested in her expected role as a submissive housewife by placing her in unnatural scenes and using minimal, dull color.

Cleaning the House, Marina Abramovic

Frida Kahlo: Kahlo is also known mostly for her self-portraits, but, just as Abramovic, has a very recognizable style. She paints in earthy colors and generally depicts robust, weighty figures; these are not women who exude feminine beauty, but are nonetheless confident in appearing front and center in any painting. Kahlo’s women are usually placed in grim, foreboding scenes, which often make a political or social statement. Her figures never smile, nor do they frown - regardless of her surrounding scene, Kahlo’s women wear neutral faces. Her paintings evoke emotion in viewer through the lack of emotion in figure.

Tree of Hope, Frida Kahlo

Cui Xiuwen: Unlike Kahlo and Abramovic, Cui Xiuwen portrays soft, feminine figures. Her use of vibrant colors and angelic figures enhance and contrast the serious, severe situation of each girl. Xiuwen focuses on the hardship of young pregnancy, and is primarily concerned with portraying the emotion of her figures. Unlike Kahlo, she evokes an emotional response in the viewer through the emotion consuming the depicted girl in the piece. Lonely, solemn, pale, pensive girls are focal points of each piece. Every girl remains isolated even when there are other figures in the scene. Xiuwen’s works embody the hopelessness and despair of young pregnant girls to which outsiders are usually blind.

Angel No. 11, Cui Xiuwen

Overview: Each artist has a very different, distinct style, and it is very interesting to see the variety of ways in which each artist conveyed her message. All three have a great talent for communicating with the viewer. I thoroughly enjoyed analyzing each artist's body of work.