Got Your Back

2020 - Painting (Painting)

91.4 x 114.8 x 21.6 cm, 2.59 minutes

Gisela McDaniel


Got Your Back by Gisela McDaniel depicts two women of color from different ethnic backgrounds who share similar violent experiences. However, the sitters never met and were depicted separately by artist Gisela McDaniel. The painting is thus an artificial construct, whose warm, gentle and seemingly benign look Is undermined by the accompanying soundtrack detailing their horrific experiences. The painting refers obliquely not only to the work of Gauguin but also Delacroix, especially his Women of Algiers (1834) and the Moroccan work of Matisse. It is thus a critique of Orientalism and the depiction of women of colour as exotic others. The inclusion of a cat may be read as a reference to Manet’s Olympia (1863). The painting combines a hot palette of colours with actual objects (the leopard skin print and the trinkets top right are all actual objects hanging off the painting and there are others applied in other areas). Got Your Back is a phrase used by one of the sitters. She had been promised that someone would look out for her but in the event it did not happen. In the soundtrack the two voices blend together, not to suggest they are conversing, but rather to lay one experience over the other. McDaniel creates an extraordinary atmosphere of homeliness, and calm—the ‘luxe, calme, et volupté’ of Matisse without the sense of sexual exploitation. Above all this is a safe space inhabited by equals and depicted with dignity. Concurrent to viewing the painting, the audience also has the opportunity to hear edited extracts from the conversations that took place between sitter and painter about the traumas that are embedded in their life experiences. This permits the viewer to witness the effect of these traumas. This necessarily conditions or alters the viewer’s response to the paintings. McDaniel gives a voice to the women who, traditionally, are the silent victims not only of violence and racial harassment, but of misogynistic depictions of the female body.


Chamorro artist Gisela McDaniel depicts Native American and mixed-race women from the USA’s former, as well as current, Pacific territories. In the process of making the works she interviews the sitters about their experiences, often of abuse, or the experience of life in these territories. What results is a critique of the continuing act of colonisation. The process of painting and talking is somewhat healing, allowing the women to be valued and heard. As an indigenous Pacific Islander herself McDaniel is interested in exploring connections between nature, displacement and violence against women, asserting that these factors are not only deeply entwined but can also serve as a key to healing. Her portraits nod knowingly towards the work of nineteenth century artists and in that aspect offer a critique of their exploitative, exotic art. In her words her goal is to “question and decolonise visual representations of the Pacific and to locate myself in that history as a working fine artist/activist.” She often combines painting with found objects, stating that the addition of objects lends the paintings the immediacy of lived experience. While viewing the painting the viewer has the opportunity to hear edited extracts from the conversations that took place between sitter and painter about the traumas that are embedded in their experience of life. This permits the viewer to witness the effect of these traumas. This necessarily conditions or alters the viewer’s response to the paintings. McDaniel gives a voice to the women who, traditionally, are the silent victims not only of violence and racial harassment but of the male depictions of the female body.


Colors:



Related works sharing similar palette

Podcast 106: Boom
© » ARTS EQUATOR

Podcast 106: Boom | ArtsEquator Skip to content In our latest podcast, we discuss Boom, a production by A Mirage which took place on 1-20 July 2022...

The Business of Being an Art Collector: A Roundtable Discussion With Three Top Patrons About How the Pursuit Has Changed - via artnet news
© » LARRY'S LIST

Patrizia Sandretto Re Rebaudengo, Dimitris Daskalopoulos, and Paul Ettlinger sit down to discuss how art collecting has evolved....

Elysian
© » KADIST

D’Angelo Lovell Williams

2018

On January 7th, 2020, artist D’Angelo Lovell Williams was diagnosed with HIV...

Subverting the Canon:Grace Lau Review
© » AESTHETICA

Aesthetica Magazine - Subverting the Canon: Grace Lau Review Subverting the Canon: Grace Lau Review In 2004, British-Chinese photographer Grace Lau (b...

Partituras
© » KADIST

Raimond Chaves and Mantilla Gilda

2009

Many of Chaves and Gilda’s works use recycled cardboard...

Collector Qiao Zhibing's Tank Shanghai Museum Opens on West Bund Waterfront - via The Art Newspaper
© » LARRY'S LIST

The reborn oil tanks host shows by teamLab, Adrián Villar Rojas and assorted Chinese artists...

La Loge Harlem
© » KADIST

Abigail DeVille

2017

The work La Loge Harlem focuses on the history of Harlem and its development over the last 200 years...

Monica Sorelle Interviewed by Monica Uszerowicz
© » BOMB

BOMB Magazine | Monica Sorelle Interviewed Necessary (Required) Cookies that the site cannot function properly without...

Experiencing a slice of life: Artist’s Block by ArtWave
© » ARTS EQUATOR

Experiencing a slice of life: Artist’s Block by ArtWave | ArtsEquator Thinking and Talking about Arts and Culture in Southeast Asia ArtsEquator Viewpoints Zinkie Aw March 1, 2022 By Noorul Raaha As’art (830 words, 3-minute read) Waterloo Street is a smorgasbord of sensory experiences, from Hindu and Buddhist temples coexisting side by side, to old uncles and aunties hawking religious paraphernalia, shaded by their New Moon abalone umbrellas, and stalls offering acupuncture services, amongst other things...

Season 3 of The White Lotus promises to be even more twisted
© » I-D

Everything we know about The White Lotus Season 3: Plot, Cast, Location, Rumours advertisement...

The Pop Culture-Infused Paintings of Dave Pollot
© » HIGH FRUCTOSE

Dave Pollot revitalizes thrift store paintings with surreal or pop culture-centered flourishes...

Step Inside Serena Williams' Striking Florida Home and Art Collection - Architectural Digest
© » LARRY'S LIST

At home north of Miami, Serena Williams holds court in a house designed in collaboration with her sister Venus...

Stan Squirewell Interviewed by Jodie Bass
© » BOMB

BOMB Magazine | Stan Squirewell Interviewed Necessary (Required) Cookies that the site cannot function properly without...

5 Museum Exhibitions to See in Miami During Art Basel
© » GALERIE MAGAZINE

5 Museum Exhibitions to See in Miami During Art Basel - Galerie Subscribe Art + Culture Interiors Style + Design Emerging Artists Discoveries Artist Guide More Creative Minds Life Imitates Art Real estate Events Video Galerie House of Art and Design Subscribe About Press Advertising Contact Us Follow Galerie Sign up to receive our newsletter Subscribe Installation view of "Hernan Bas: The Conceptualists" at the Bass Museum of Art, Miami Beach...

Explore the largest-ever show on German photographer Juergen Teller’s work.
© » WONDERLAND

Explore Triennale Milano's 'Juergen Teller i need to live', the largest-ever show on the German photographer’s work....

Stanley "Tom" Durrell, Tinsmith
© » KADIST

Sharon Lockhart

2008

Lockhart’s film Lunch Break investigates the present state of American labor, through a close look at the everyday life of the workers at the Bath Iron Works shipyard—a private sector of the U...

Black Star Press
© » KADIST

Kelley Walker

2004

The triptych Black Star Press is part of the series ‘The Black Star Press project’ initiated in 2004 by the American artist Kelley Walker...

Fordlândia Fieldwork
© » KADIST

Clarissa Tossin

2012

In Fordlândia Fieldwork (2012), Tossin documents the remains of Henry Ford’s rubber enterprise Fordlândia, built in 1928 in the Brazilian Amazon to export cultivated rubber for the booming automobile industry...