Featured Artist Jane Caminos

Artist Jane Caminos’ vivid paintings show acts of violence against women around the world, and send a powerful message. Visit her website to learn more.

 

 

Most of us have settled into a style of art making that intrigues us, challenges our mastery of technique, and is suited to serve as the messenger that conveys our stories to our viewers. I gathered up preferences for color and patterning born of Matisse and Gauguin while going to art school at RISD in the Warholian late 60’s.

 

 

By the 1970’s I’d discovered I was an illustrator who loved to paint, so while working as an art director for books, novelties and periodicals, I also drew a hell of a lot for freelance bucks and painted all sorts of things late into the night, still searching.

 

 

While looking through family albums made in the thirties and forties, I was enchanted by the snaps of aunts and girlfriends wearing the flowery frocks, pompadour hairdos, and dark lipstick popular in those years. So began my love affair with painting women.

 

 

I’d select a photo that was populated by women whose personalities and style were appealing to interpret, and invite them onto a canvas to be transformed by my imagination.

 

 

The goal was never to simply copy the snap as some artists do. It was to use the image as a starting off place to which I could add props and gimmicks that would explain their lives, true or not, to my viewers.

 

 

Since the mid 70’s, as a dedicated, enthusiastic feminist, I’ve painted dozens of “life times” of my own making; most of these add a humorous sprinkling to the stories, although now and then more serious occasions have flavored the scene.

 

 

I built a reputation with my collection of women of all ages and have never become bored by my decision to paint one gender. I’ve got to admit that when the time arrived for my first solo exhibition, I was so intimidated that I sat across the street from the glass fronted gallery, afraid to enter even as the guests streamed in.

 

 

After watching a PBS documentary about the 2012 gang rape and subsequent death of twenty-three year old student Jyoti Singh in Delhi, I reacted with tearful rage. The next day I resolved to put aside painting my comfortable portraits of women.

 

 

Instead I began “On Women Bound,” a series of oil and mixed media paintings designed to expose violence against women and girls across all cultures around the world.

 

 

It’s my intent that as viewers study the art, they will begin a dialogue about gender based crime which will be carried out into their lives, thus building an awareness that even in the suburban United States, blonde girls are stolen every day, and across the world one in three females will be raped, have their genitals mutilated, be forced into marriage as children, stoned for adultery, caned for flirting, or had their faces melted by acid thrown by a dissatisfied mother-in-law.

 

 

They will be made into sex slaves, deprived of an education, forbidden to leave home without a male relative, forced to kill newborn babies should they be female, murdered by their fathers for dishonoring the family, and much more.

 

 

I’ve chosen not to detail the more horrendous occurrences, and to include occasions when victims celebrate their victories over oppressors. Some days the rougher work gets to me and I take a break by painting a brighter theme.

 

 

Now that I’m an artist activist with On Women Bound as my life’s work, I’ve come to believe that as artists it’s our responsibility to use our talent to change the world for the better. What do you think?

 

Artist Jane Caminos invites you to follow her on Facebook.

 

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