laurencunninghamart.com

Deep Seat
2010
Tableau with performers and handcrafted stool, mirror, and costumes

Deep Seat raises questions about the transferring and inheriting of traditional female roles within the family unit. The artwork depicts a scene of an older woman sitting on a stool behind a younger woman. Twine still in hand, the older woman has just braided the hair of the younger woman, who inspects herself in a mirror. The age difference between the women and the intimacy involved in hair-tying suggest that they are mother and daughter.

Upon closer inspection, one realizes that the mother's stool has brooms for legs, and the braid in the daughter's hair matches the stitching of the brooms. These anomalies suggest that the mother's role in the family is domestic, as indicated by her position atop the broom-stool, and that she is literally and figuratively grooming her daughter to follow in her footsteps.