Scenes of Self: Redressing Patriarchy II

Drawing together self-portraits and photographic documents, Scenes of Self: Redressing Patriarchy II threads a narrative in black and white on the underpinnings of elitism in US history and culture—a history dating back to the 19th century—of an emerging wealthy economy sustained by the slave market and commodities of its production. A meticulous interpretation of a historicized past eliding with the future, this thesis charts a path toward ancestral recollection to critique the livelihoods of merchants who were also enslavers. This thesis takes up the concept of Afro-surrealism (a movement led by Black artists of the 1970s concerned with the future-past) and examines the interior and exterior of selected plantation homes belonging to prominent cotton and sugarcane merchants in Louisiana and South Carolina. By selectively fashioning white cotton dress shirts and oscillating between gendered presentations of masculinity and femininity, this thesis stands to critique the merchants themselves while offering representation to the formerly enslaved and their descendants. Photographs of objects denoting beauty, desire, and exoticism serve as surrogates of the preconceived identities of Black and white Americans. As these sites distort their involvement in chattel slavery by converting to resorts and spas and parks in the present, this thesis engages the photographic medium, fashion, and the self to expose their histories.