GALLERIES
CONTACT:
ryndrury@gmail.com
c:(859)240-9266
STATEMENT
_______________________________________
Where is the intersection of the public persona and the individual's sense of self?
What does it mean to construct one's identity?
Are we defined by our choices or by how we are perceived?
When does the individual lose a sense of self within the context of the rest of humanity?
These are all questions which I have been exploring within my recent work. More particularly I am interested in the construction and deconstruction of the public figure and the cult of personality in political, religious and popular culture.
________________
STATEMENTS FOR INDIVIDUAL PROJECTSs
_____________________________________________________
FACES OF POWER
(2008)
original collage and digital print series
Faces Of Power (2008), a series of fifteen photo montage prints, act as a study of the disconnect between the mythologies of the public persona and the individual’s identity. A large component of politics seems to be the constant striving of politicians to “earn” the trust of their constituents.
The façade of honesty and impeccable morality is assumed by every politician. It often seems to be more about who can appear to be the most honest and moral (to poll standards) and who can make the most promises. We know all politicians bend the truth to a greater or lesser degree, yet they continue to base most of their public personae on a pretense of honesty. The candidate who appears the most honest and moral is the most electable.
The mythologies built up around leaders who explain why they are more fit to rule than anyone else have been present for thousands of years. Most recently, Americans have believed they have moral superiority and believe they can therefore act to police the rest of the world; as evidenced by the justifications for the Korean War, Vietnam War, the Gulf War, and the Iraq Conflict.
The current Iraq conflict is perhaps the most disturbing case in recent U.S. history of using justifications in the guise of faith and morality to legitimize political power and monetary gain. President Bush publicly claimed that God has called him to War with Iraq. He said, “We are in a conflict between good and evil and America will call evil by its name.”
Like many leaders of our past Bush raises himself as the judge of the rest of the world on behalf of America. Since the reasons for war weren’t to keep America safe-- no weapons of mass destruction were found in Iraq, and therefore no evidence existed to support engaging in combative conflict-- we can only assume from our past experiences with leaders of this kind that the gain was either to achireve gain in terms of money, for natural resources, or power. In this case, we must assue the motivation was to gain power orver oil and/or over the president's own people and the people of Iraq.
These prints act to question the two-faced morality of our leaders past and present and to critique why we the people do not do enough to hold them accountable for their promises to exercise honesty, tolerance, and moral leadership.
_______________________________________________________________________________
_______________________________________________________________________________