Between Morality and Myth: A Parodic Visual Manifesto

Acting on the belief that art communicates, that an image speaks all languages, these works were created as a visual manifesto responding satirically to the absurd way in which myths are elevated to the status of moral values. The photographic works created for this thesis challenge long held beliefs and emotions that associate sex with shame and guilt, and that grow out of the moral traditions we have inherited. Judeo-Christian traditions and religious beliefs have created widely unchallenged social/moral constructs, which regard sexuality and sexual awareness as sinful and woman as subservient to the moral authority constructed by men. I am reacting to the moral concepts that originate from myths. With a post-modernist approach, I visually explored ways to present metaphoric characters that communicate my ideas by dressing a male penis as a puppet and creating a new mythical narrative to substitute for those that we inherited and continue to believe. The works created for this thesis challenge that tradition. This supporting paper is a product of my research for my Master in Fine Arts entitled Between Morality and Myth: A Parodic Visual Manifesto, a photographic body of work consists of two photographic suites: first the portrait suite entitled Mr. Peter; secondly the narrative suite entitled Peter\u27s Lament, created at Georgia Southern University in the School of Visual Arts in the year two thousand and eleven