This work is panel from a diptych exploring the commodification of the female body. It references the visual language of strip clubs and peep shows, where the combination of a provocative outlined female form and expectant language creates a cultural framework in which lived bodies are reduced to outlines or performative functions.

As I worked through successive iterations of the composition, applying different visual treatments to the mannequins, states of ambiguity arose. When reduced to simple outlines, for example, the distinction between the human form and a mannequin begins to disappear. For the image to remain legible, the figures needed to retain recognisable mannequin characteristics while avoiding full photorealism. The process therefore involved finding a visual balance in which the object remained identifiable as a mannequin while still operating within the graphic language of neon signage.

This ambiguity in form has parallels with earlier explorations of fragmented or constructed bodies within Surrealism, particularly the Surrealist exhibition of 1938. In that exhibition mannequins were presented as theatrical stand-ins for the human figure, occupying an unstable position between sculpture, object and body. In both contexts the mannequin becomes a site onto which cultural anxieties about representation, desire and the construction of the body are projected.