Katerina Jebb
Katerina Jebb’s first works were photomontages which she created inside a camera, originating from repeated exposure of a single roll of film. In 1991 she was involved in a car accident which paralyzed her right arm. To resolve the inability to hold a camera, Jebb began to employ machines to make life-size images, primarily self-portraits of her aying down on a high resolution scanning machine. Progressively, she diversified, posing subjects and objects, exploring the medium in parallel with the expanding possibilities in digital technology. Jebb proceeded to remove parts of the scanner to facilitate maximum extension of the subject. The duration of each passage of the scanner echoed early photographic principles, being seven minutes long, therefore demanding of the sitter to lie motionless for 28 minutes. The resulting images, suspended and lifelike, have been embraced as a new visual medium.
Jebb's work has flourished from its photographic origins, proceeding to disrupt the boundaries between mediums. Her photography has made way for video art, installations, and sculpture. In her work, Jebb considers the human condition with arrant sensitivity, offering the viewer a depiction of women that rejects the normalized, commercial female role. Her most recent series, Simulacrum and Hyperbole (2009-2011) offers …
Katerina Jebb’s first works were photomontages which she created inside a camera, originating from repeated exposure of a single roll of film. In 1991 she was involved in a car accident which paralyzed her right arm. To resolve the inability to hold a camera, Jebb began to employ machines to make life-size images, primarily self-portraits of her aying down on a high resolution scanning machine. Progressively, she diversified, posing subjects and objects, exploring the medium in parallel with the expanding possibilities in digital technology. Jebb proceeded to remove parts of the scanner to facilitate maximum extension of the subject. The duration of each passage of the scanner echoed early photographic principles, being seven minutes long, therefore demanding of the sitter to lie motionless for 28 minutes. The resulting images, suspended and lifelike, have been embraced as a new visual medium.
Jebb's work has flourished from its photographic origins, proceeding to disrupt the boundaries between mediums. Her photography has made way for video art, installations, and sculpture. In her work, Jebb considers the human condition with arrant sensitivity, offering the viewer a depiction of women that rejects the normalized, commercial female role. Her most recent series, Simulacrum and Hyperbole (2009-2011) offers a critique of women's representation in television and advertising through parodic videos featuring renowned female icons. These works simultaneously evoke laughter and pathos in their observance of the irrationality of popular expectations of women.
Her work has been exhibited at institutions such as the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York, Centre Pompidou in Paris, Metropolitan Art Museum Tokyo, Palais de Tokyo in Paris, and Sydney’s Museum of Contemporary Art.
Courtesy of the artist
Musée des Arts Décoratifs du Louvre, Paris, France
Musée Réattu, Arles, France
Musée Galliera, Paris, France