Under The Wings of Artemis

PAGE

78 - 79

On other pages Gaulke’s indictment of coerced foot beauty is viscerally illustrated. A prime example is the coupling of an X-ray image of a bound foot, a row of nails pointing threateningly upward toward the sole, and a posterized picture of a foot in a stiletto heel. The visual similarities are blazingly clear. This pair of images alone is a damning impeachment of the mystique of contorted women’s feet.

In some situations, a woman’s goal is not the attainment of anything approaching “perfect beauty,” but rather an effort to reconfigure an imperfect body to fit it to acceptable standards of appearance. Tamar Stone, the creator of Curvatures, suffers from scoliosis, a spinal curvature that kept her in a restrictive brace 23 hours a day during most of her teen years.

Curvatures
Tamar Stone

In an adroit merging of material and content, Stone has made the pages of the book from corseting elastic and, on the cover, added such referential features as stocking garters that wrap around the book’s binding. Together, the two garters are a marvelous metaphor: they clasp the spine of the book, holding it in perfect alignment. The images on the cover and within the book range from vintage illustrations (some embroidered) to photographs of girls in braces to various

spinal X-rays, including the artist’s own. On each right-hand page a capital letter appears with a legend beneath, much like a child’s alphabet book. However, the beginning letter is “C” followed by the line, “Clever Lines Create Beauty.” It continues in this manner, from page to page, spelling out the word “curvatures.”

Curvatures
Tamar Stone