In advertising photography you need to be visually succinct to ensure that the idea you are exploring comes across clearly. Fashion is about selling an ideal. You have to understand how people think in order to sell to them. This kind of framework has been really useful in the development of my photographic art. I have often asked myself “How can I use the familiar codes of fashion and advertising to subvert the message?”

Meret Oppenheim was a strong early reference, as was Hans Bellmer. I also responded to photographer Guy Bourdin’s unique way of blending surrealism with classic fashion images to create photos that hinted at consumption and the role of desire. His photography was quite radical for the time and I love the sense of dark humour in them. He both seduced and shocked viewers. That being said, I do feel that the imagery was a reflection of the wider cultural attitudes of the times, which presented ‘desirable’ women as sexual provocateurs. I must admit I now roll my eyes when advertising presents women the same way. I know sex sells, but haven’t we developed a little more sophistication in the way we think about what makes a woman desirable?

To be honest, I don’t have any tricks up my sleeves. All of the objects in Covetous were physically made and then photographed. While I initially trained in photography, my arts practice includes sculpture and video. To me, part of the process is the creation of the object. How I want the viewers to engage with an image will dictate whether it is exhibited as a sculpture or as a photograph. With Covetous I felt that the medium of photography was very important to the reading of the work. We desire objects because we see them on the hand of a celebrity, pictured on Instagram or in a magazine. I felt it was important to reflect the medium in which these desires are developed and exploited. The iSPAM was exactly that, an iPod crafted out of gelatine and Spam (tin compressed meat).

I have always been interested in contemporary attitudes and the way they manifest through popular culture. I read Barbara Creed’s Monstrous Feminine and was intrigued by her examination of how women were portrayed in horror films. This started me thinking about the other ways in which women are portrayed in the wider cultural landscape. How they feel they need to conform to a particular cultural ideal in order to be viewed as ‘desirable’.

Well, appearances can be deceiving. I’m not sure how one can quantify whether makeup and heels make women happy. Personally, I believe that makeup and heels make women feel more confident because they are conforming to a social norm that is deemed acceptable. The makeup gives us flawless skin and the heels slim our legs because both these things are desirable. Yes, we are doing it because we want to feel good about ourselves, and there is nothing wrong with this. But why can we only feel good about ourselves when we look a particular way?

Feminism has paved the way for neo-feminism. Without the actions of the feminists from the 1960s and 1970s demanding equality for women we would not be in the position to question what we are doing now. In many cultures women are fighting for the right to get education and control over their reproductive rights, so defending a ‘woman’s right to be sexy’ is a first world privileged problem. It is very easy for beautiful, rich and successful celebrities to defend the right to be ‘sexy’. However, women are so much more than that.

Digital technologies are more powerful in shaping our cultural attitudes than plastic surgery. Cosmetic technologies are merely reflecting the market. Social media platforms such as Instagram are the new mediums in which identities are formed. The notion of a ‘selfie’ is a construct in which to present yourself to the world for as many likes as you can get. When you see millions of images of ‘normal’ people looking a certain way or doing certain things, the pressure to conform is immense.

I agree that art has reflected cultural norms throughout the ages. However, it should be noted that all of these early painting were done by men and presented an equally narrow view of women. As Siri Hustvedt quotes, “The history of art is full of women lying around naked for erotic consumption by men.” By nature we (humans) like to feel like we are part of something, so yes, to a certain degree, we are complicit. Nevertheless we need to challenge these views rather than just accept them as the status quo. We need to be reflecting a more diverse vision of women in media and advertising, which is not just for ‘erotic consumption’. This diversity needs to be real and genuine and not just in a tokenistic way so women don’t feel the need to conform to such narrow parameters.