The body is political. Whether or not the body should be brought into politics is, of course, its own debate and argument to be held, yet considering the state of the world and the planet that we live on, the body is political, whether that feels just or not.

One of many extreme turns in the world of the arts, its culture, and its surrounding politics took place in the sixties, especially politics and art encompassing ideas concerning feminism, women, and the female body; artists of the era delved into these contemporary concepts, ideas and new criticisms that were perceived as radical and outlandish at the time. 

Performance art – within this category – holds a much deeper sense of political value than other artistic means, simply because of its immense emphasis on self-insertion and – very commonly and often – high usage of the body. This applies to performance art specifically in this era’s political atmosphere, considering the high tensions around discussions surrounding topics on the body, feminism and politics.

Using the body will inherently be read as political, since the body is what is being politicized. 

One of many female artists that used the body as performance in this era was Orlan, with her most infamous work, The Reincarnation of Saint Orlan: A sequence of Orlan receiving multiple facial reconstructive cosmetic surgeries, in order to best replicate a synthesis of famous paintings’ female subjects’ facial features.

“At the Sandra Gering Gallery (1990,) a thirty-six-inch TV set was switched on to reveal the operating room located elsewhere in New York City, the image beamed to us live via satellite. After some artful preparations, the surgical moment arrived: Orlan, lying down, is injected by a long needle under her scalp. (Camera zooms in.) But this is simulacrum of an operation, it is the real thing. Soon, the surgeon is sawing away methodically scraping out flesh from below the hairline. The gallery empties of a third of its audience. After forty-five minutes, the monitor is finally turned off-that’s all for now, announces gallery owner Gering, smiling, to the few hardy souls who remain” (Carrie Lovelace, Orlan Offensive Acts, p. 13.)

According to Carrie Lovelace’s “Orlan Offensive Acts,” the response given to Orlan was immensely political. Many believed that her work surrounding concepts of the body and body image was a direct critique on the prominent issue of “male gaze”, and the lengths women have acceded to achieve these superficial standards created by men.

However, Orlan was actually openly supportive of cosmetic surgeries, and did not view them in this given political manner, like many critics had claimed to be her motif.

“After hearing a few words from Orlan it became clear that not only is she not against surgical interventions to alter appearance, she seems veritably positive on the subject: ‘In future times we’ll change our bodies as easily as our hair color,’ she proclaims” (Carrie Lovelace, Orlan Offensive Acts, p. 13.)

In this particularly loud and frisky political climate, it would seem quite obvious to me that works involving the body would hold a political connotation of any potency, despite the artists personal opinions and intentions.

The comparison of different artists of the time who use similar, if not the same, mediums such as the body, we can understand these different approaches and connect them by how they were received by the public and other artists. 

An example of this would be Judy Chicago’s The Dinner Party, 1974-79. In this piece, thirty nine place settings were designed on a triangular table, each representing important historical women from around the world. Using traditional “feminine” claimed art forms such as ceramic, needlepoint, and embroidery, each place setting is designed with implicit intention of metaphorical female genitalia.

In comparison (with Lovelace’s understanding of Orlan,) Chicago explicitly depicts the body as political by crafting political, prominent female characters from history alongside highly controversial explicit imagery of what is interpreted – and plainly visible – as the female body. While Orlan holds more emphasis on the “act of becoming” in her works, without exterior critique from male counterparts – a simple reflection of the reformation process – Chicago hold emphasis on the precise political connotations alongside her work, pointing out these patriarchal ideals and contradictions in connection with the female body.  

Another artist comparable with Orlan would be Hannah Wilke, an American feminist painter, sculptor and photographer, especially her piece S.O.S. – Stratification Object Series, 1974.

“Wilke’s labia-shaped, chewing-gum sculptures” (Chave, p. 107) were explicit renderings of the relationship between the female body and the male gaze, considering Wilke’s idea for the piece to be inspired by how men treat women like chewing gum. Take a piece, chew it up, spit it out, pop in the next one. Again, this heavily compares to Orlan’s Reincarnation of St. Orlan which served as more of a reflection of the changing body, versus Wilke and Chicago’s critique on it.

Orlan’s piece is interpreted politically because of the indirect, but evident political messaging behind it. The body is inherently political, and by performing with her own body, especially as a woman, it inherently creates room for political discussion. It must have been impossible for an artist in this particular atmosphere to engage the body without awareness or intentions behind the way it would be received by the public, critics and other artists. That being said, there still holds a differing manner of representation and intent in these three pieces of art. Orlan simply shows us a process of bodily alteration, while Wilke and Chicago openly and explicitly prove its political overtones, while all three involve similar political implication.