Side Profile Series questions identity
ArtPic artist: Shantel Miller Artwork: Stefan, oil on board, 18” x 24”
Show: skin glowing in the moonlight
Description: Facing right, the portraits in Toronto painter Shantel Miller’s The Side Profile Series naturally lead you in an unending circle around the walls of Latitude 53, painted canary yellow to match the show.
Were these portraits of white people, would we as quickly associate the lush and beautiful oils with images of police photography? It’s one of the basic questions this exploration of identity asks, coupled with Danièle Dennis’ striking video performances where she blackens her body with makeup, felt markers and dirt and — in another — covers herself in pink cotton candy. The binaries and tensions between the works are a fascinating whirlwind.
Miller and Dennis will be in Edmonton, giving a conversational talk 7 p.m. Saturday about their experiences as black women and the realities of their communities in Toronto.
As far as the paintings go, their subjects were mined from Miller’s family and friends — people at risk from all sorts of unfair institutional nonsense simply because of who they were born.
Miller explains, “The entire series was birthed out of my relationship with my brothers. I have two brothers — they’re in the series, Sebastian and Stefan. The series encapsulates the sensitivity I have toward the black male subjects versus how society sees black men.
“I portrayed them in this very specific way as a way to reference mug-shot photography, to think critically about black figures, black men. I want the viewer to think about what kind of connotations they have when they see a black figure in this very specific way.
“Also to show how vulnerable black men are in society. Their gaze is averted away from the viewer, but that also kind of empowers them, because they refuse to engage in this very specific reading of them.
“I’m using yellow because it’s like a spotlight is cast on them, to re-inform the very stark shadow. The spotlight’s cast on them, and that speaks to how black bodies perform in society. It also touches on different features with black skin.