Venus of Willendorf

Multimedia Collage

24" x36"

With this piece, I chose to appropriate/reimagine the original Venus of Willendorf sculpture because it was believed to be a fetish object or fertility symbol. In art history and even today, lot of times when I saw figures that look like her or steatopygous figures, they are attributed to mammy stereotypes, mothering roles, fertility symbols and sometimes used as foils. I wanted to show this with the use of these fertility symbols such as the cowrie shells and the shell necklace from the 1900s on top of the popular cannon of "The Birth of Venus" and show the "weight" that women carry around with them. What has be subconsciously been taught to women that their purpose is through repeated messages fed to us?