PAST EXHIBITION

Scènes et Types

Tiana Markova-Gold

with writing by Sarah Dohrmann

Artist Talk: Wednesday, April 24, 7pm
Tiana Markova-Gold with Sarah Dohrmann

Scènes et Types, a solo exhibition by 2012 Baxter St at CCNY Darkroom Resident Tiana Markova-Gold, highlights a long-term collaborative project with writer Sarah Dohrmann about women on the fringes of society in modern day Morocco. This exhibition marks the third of four solo exhibitions from the recipients of the 2012 Baxter St at CCNY Darkroom Residency Program.

Tiana Markova-Gold says about this project: Scènes et Types is a collaborative project about prostitution and the marginalization of women in Morocco. The project combines my documentary photographs and photomontage with a long-form essay written by Sarah Dohrmann. Initiated in 2008, we returned to Morocco in 2011 with funding from the Center for Documentary Studies at Duke University as recipients of the 2010 Dorothea Lange-Paul Taylor Prize.

Scènes et Types intimately portrays women who rely on sex work to survive. Scènes et Types tells the story of Moroccan women who, upon losing their virginity, had little choice but to become prostitutes. It discusses how their lives, sexual choices, and motherhood have been determined by society and culture. While this feminine and political exploration draws lines between ourselves and the women we portray, it also destroys those lines, leaving the narrative to rest in the awkward reality of compassion and communion alongside abstraction and disconnect—a space that often constitutes foreign relations.

My approach to the project was grounded in a strong documentary practice, shooting still photographs and recording audio. With this project I also began to explore the use of collage?photomontage by cutting the photographs I was making and piecing them back together, layering and juxtaposing the images. We were spending time with women who were pushed to the edges of society – single mothers, divorcées, prostitutes. Many did not feel safe having their faces photographed or simply being photographed at all, so I began to use the collages as a way to protect the women’s identities when necessary. I began to manipulate my photographs as a way to explore ideas around representation and perception, sexuality, the idealization and?or demonization of women’s bodies, the legacy of colonization, and the impact of Orientalist representations of North African women.