I explore photography and its convoluted relationship with reality. Currently my work centres on capturing images of constructed spaces that I have produced. The pictures are obviously fabricated, but can be viewed as a convincing reality that mirrors the connection between objective reality and fictional artifice that I depict in the imagery. The disparity between the ego, alter ego and the ego ideal of the central character is a major focus of the work, as is the construction of ‘self’.

The role of the model has evolved as my visual style has matured; originally the models were throw-away constructions that formed backdrops for the action taking place within the scene. The performative nature of composing the scenes became an important aspect to the work; I was omnipotent in my manipulations of the characters. I sought to recreate this feeling of power and sense of scale for the viewer, by showing doll’s houses alongside photographs. The doll’s houses are placed on the floor, encouraging the spectator to crouch down to view the work. They loom over the miniatures and peer through the windows in a god-like and voyeuristic way. The scale of the work also gives it a non-threatening edge, allowing me to portray gritty events, often with dark undertones without loosing the vein of tongue-in-cheek humour that runs through my work.

The Doll's House
'...Our home has become nothing but a playroom. I have been your doll wife, just as at home I was Papa's doll child; and here the children have been my dolls...' The Doll's House - Henrik Ibsen

This project is driven by my desire to satirise the gender specific nature of children's toys and the stereotypes they reinforce. I aim to examine the social construction of gender, as a form of learned behaviour that takes place during childhood. As they develop, children mimic their parents, forming ideas of socially acceptable gender roles for men and women. The act of playing becomes a gender performance. This extends to wider society and the bi-polar gender assumptions that exist within it. I aim to parody the notion of artifice and play by making 'cut out' self-portraits, placed inside a doll's house. To accompany this series I have created cut out identi-kits for the father and mother dolls, complete with sets of clothing that stipulate gender stereotypes.

Teaser
This site-specific piece was created for an exhibition at the Great Northern Building in Manchester. An investigation into the businesses within the building ensued and I chose three diverse companies to replicate. The predominant 'room' contains a miniture version of a Teasers bar. The opportuntity to place myself in a pole-dancing bar under the slogan 'beer and babes' was too much to resist! The virgin cosmetic and bridal shops form an enquiry into the commercial aspect of sexual politics. Although the women seem to be exploited both sexually and financially, I also take on the male roles, becoming the object of my own desire. Hopefully this illustrates the idea that advertising and beauty products serve to reinforce women as objects of the look, as we internalise the male gaze and become panoptical prisoners.

We Didn't Mean To Be Bad Kids, Tv Made Us Do It
The brightly coloured photographs depict a family of dolls going about their daily lives. By performing both the male and female characters I hope to subvert social assumptions of masculine and feminine roles in the home. Set within a homemade doll's house, the combination of banal photographic cut-outs and Blue Peter style decoration give the viewer an unsettling view of my miniturised world and blurs the boundary between rose-tinted childhood memories and subjective adult sensibilities.

Peep Show
Press Release

The Other woman
For this series of photographs I decided to further explore the idea of the archetypal woman. Having performed a negative stereotype through the Doll's House mother I have decided to take on a more assertive role, that of the manipulative seductress. Although the femme fatale reinforces the idea of women as sexual objects, she is one of the few cinematic representations of women as active subjects. She may display herself in a sexually alluring way, but her purpose is not linked to the sexual gratification of men. The femme fatale drives the plot of film noir and dominates the lens whilst the leading men succumb to her power and do her bidding. She is the antithesis of patriarchal social order and threatens to shake the foundations of the nuclear family.

Ego
The work represents a world of my own making – a parody of my life built in cardboard, plastic and paint. The miniature house is a copy of my own home, reduced to doll sized proportions, that adds an uncanny edge to the work and allows the viewer to make correlations between the object and original scene. Questions of authenticity are raised in my obsessive quest for accuracy and faithful miniaturisation.

The egos in the doll’s house are depicted at the moment the façade of the socially constructed ego is dropped. The ego and its ideal are played off against one and other. When the images are viewed collectively, their contradictory nature disallows any notion of confession and truth in the work. It purposefully rejects the notion of the self-portrait functioning to represent the artists true ‘self’. It does not characterise self-portraiture in a conventional sense, but depicts my body as a medium through which I comment on self/identity and social analysis. By leading the spectator towards an assumption of self in the work, I have succeeded in creating a greater, more credible fiction.

Stranger than Fiction
In order to negate the dishonesty of previous work, I have decided to recreate scenes directly from memory. The action that takes place in Stranger than Fiction relates to specific moments of my past (and present). Rather than creating fictitious scenes set in real places (albeit model replicas), I will recreate scenes from memory in the locations the events first took place.

The resulting photographs will depict moments of disappointment, inadequacy and vulnerability. Rather than implying imperfection, as I have done in the ego series, I have chosen to catalogue the evidence against me. Every inconsistency in my evolving self will come under the microscope as I document each facet of my personal history and try to make sense of the end result - ‘Dawn Woolley’. As the cut-out figures will be relatively small scale, the locations in which they are set will be unrecognisable to the viewer. Places of significance will be reduced to generic brick wall, pavement and grass. The use of the ‘original’ locale is purely for my own purposes, like the faithful miniaturisation of my own home in the previous project, it points towards an obsessive need to make accurate records.