In Conversation: Suzy Lake

INTERVIEW

BY ANNA KOVLER

Published Nov 7, 2019

Suzy Lake - Portrait

Since the early 1970’s Suzy Lake has been at the forefront of Canadian art, forming a prolific corpus that blends photography, conceptualism and performance. Born and raised in Detroit, Lake witnessed the bloody 12th Street Riot of 1967, was involved in grassroots political organizing, and maintained close ties to that city as it slipped from industrial powerhouse to national icon of economic bust. 

Working with Photography in Canada however was not easy. Prior to 1960, photographs rarely entered the collections of major Canadian institutions and when they did often displayed documentary concerns rather than conceptual ones. Against and despite a backdrop of entrenched prejudices, Lake produced many photographic and sculptural series, which today are recognized as the greatest artistic achievements of this country. Being awarded the prestigious Scotiabank Photography Award in 2016, Lake is a beacon of formal rigor, political engagement, and perseverance for several generations of artists. 

I spoke with Suzy on the occasion of her solo exhibition at Arsenal Contemporary Art in New York, which includes pieces from five decades of her prolific career. 

Anna Kovler: You are known primarily as a photographer but I know you trained as a painter and printmaker. Does your early training impact how you take pictures?

Suzy Lake: Definitely. A lot of my formal training comes into play in terms of orchestrating the image so the viewer can read the pacing of the concepts I want to develop. Whether its black and white photography or color photography, my printmaking background really influences the work in terms of color choice or staging. I believe everything is information, and I know photographers believe that too, but I also take into account very formal elements and transpose them into the image. That said, I think the primary language and sensibility in my images is rooted in performance.

AK: Looking at your series Imitation of Myself 1 & 2 - where you apply makeup over your face that was first painted white - makes me suddenly self-aware of my own makeup ritual. Is this the effect you intended? 

SL: Well, those images worked to critique the imposition of media or youth culture on the representation of women. I find that imposition is different from enhancement. At a certain point, media sets a standard of an idealized construct we are all competing towards. The white face - as the first layer - is like a tabula rasa. In Montréal I studied mime, and that’s really how you begin character from a point of nothing. In my artworks, to apply the makeup on the white face, just a normal amount that women would use to enhance themselves, but on top of the white layer it becomes a mask. That way, I can talk about that imposition as a mask to identify with culture  - as opposed to identifying with the self - hence the titles being “simulation” or “imitation” of the self. 

AK: I definitely thought of mimes or Japanese Kabuki theatre when I first saw your face painted white. Where did you study mime?

SL: I actually took a course at Théâtre de Quat'Sous in Montréal, and got quite involved with it. It was wonderful because if you use the white face to get to zero, all the communication happens through gestures of the body … and it was good physical training! Then, the white face and mime influenced my moving away front portraits to let body expression direct movement, like in my series Choreographed Puppet (1976). At first I did it for physical exercise, but then I was learning so much about the meaning behind this theatrical format, that it became a reference in my work. 

AK: You have been making work with a feminist sensibility since the early 1970’s. Has much changed since you were making works like Imitation of Myself (1973) and Who Pulls the Strings (1976)?

SL: There was certainly quite a resistance to the early work I made, and I was a little bit late to realize that the male gaze wasn't looking at the image of an artist, but the object of a woman.  That work garnered some attention because it was different, but on the other hand the gender difference kept my work at the margins because there wasn't a critical language at the time to deal with that work, because everything fell either under the rubric of conceptual art or the minimalist approach to art making. Then, around the late 90s and early 2000s a lot of historic shows of women’s work went up, and it was amazing because the language was suddenly there, and women writers were writing about the work - about the way it was made rather than trying to make it fit the rubric of the 1970’s. That was good for women. In terms of what’s going on now … the move towards conservatism concerns me because it raises issues of women’s rights over their bodies. 

I couldn’t get through watching Mad Men because in reality women were treated much worse than that. I recall going to get birth control with my mother, even after being married, because it wasn’t even available. Relative to the #MeToo movement, in 1968 we were taught that boys will be boys … and of course they’re going to ‘steal the milk and not buy the cow’! The fact that women can actually stand up for themselves now is very very important, because we’re not property anymore, and women really were treated as if we were property.

AK: The photos in Beauty at a Proper Distance/In Song (2001-2) are a critique of our youth-obsessed culture. Can you elaborate on that? 

SL: Being the generation of feminist women moving into the 90’s and 2000’s I found that there really was an ageism. And although nothing was directly “attacked” at me per-se, people would say things, that you’re the exception. There was a sense that I had had my time, and now it’s time to move aside for the next generation. Whereas men were considered mature and attractive, and their practice had gone on for a long time, and they had this long history… It made me angry! So I started doing work that was actually celebrating life experience and having battle scars from surviving tough times. I was trying to create a different beauty. It was a real panic for me to go into this, but I felt like I had nothing to lose. 

When I made Beauty at a Proper Distance, Cher was doing her last farewell tour, and I could look at her costume and know that she was wearing these translucent tights to give the illusion that she has legs without cellulite. And she’s such a dynamite singer, that it’s really unfortunate she has to do something like that, its not right. 

AK: What are you working on next?

SL: There is nothing concrete yet, but I leave on Tuesday for Paris Photo where my book from the Scotiabank Photography Award - along with other exceptional artists - will be featured at the Steidl Publishers booth. I’m excited to wander around and see lots of international work and different approaches to things. I love being challenged to think in different ways, and when I come home all the things I'm thinking about will emerge in new forms. 

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