Far From

In my project “Far From” I combine landscape photographs of the American West with embroidery to challenge the masculinity of traditional landscape photography and the myth of the West. Landscape photography was historically dominated by male photographers as it was deemed unsafe and impractical for women who were constrained to the domestic sphere. The myths of the American West, its rugged, open, wild landscape have also been closely associated with macho masculinity. Embroidery has been traditionally labelled as women’s work, as something that women can do within the safety of the home, compatible with their domestic duties.Things have changed and landscape photography is open to female photographers now. Or is it? I made the black and white landscape photographs used in this project at the fringes of family trips. I embroidered them in the safety of my home, the work repeatedly interrupted and resumed while also taking care of my two children. I am drawing on the history of embroidery as both a symbol of female submission and a weapon of resistance for women, and overlaying that to the masculinity of landscape photography and the American West.