Plastic surgery

In response to Snaggle Tooth = Social Suicide and Spinsterhood, I’d like bring up an artist who turns on its head this idea of having to look a certain way (and having to go through cosmetic dentistry or surgery or what have you to get there). I don’t know if any of you have heard of Orlan but she’s definitely one of the most provocative artists I know of. Her art is her face. She undergoes cosmetic operations to contort her face in ways that are completely foreign to the operations we usually encounter. For her, a nose job might make her nose enormous or she may try to copy the Roman nose. The surgery that stood out most to me when I got to see her give a lecture in LA last spring were two enormous implants, one at each temple (she had decorated them with glitter for the lecture). Orlan undergoes the entire operation while remaining conscious and even talking. She has the “performance” telecasted to select places around the world. The art is pretty gruesome to watch but that definitely is part of her point.

The interesting thing about Orlan’s take on plastic surgery and the human body is that she thinks the body has become obsolete. There are different standards of beauty in different cultures and when mixed together they do not always appear beautiful. For her, plastic surgery is not about conforming to society’s standard that one must get rid of their snaggle tooth if they are ever to lead a successful or fulfilling life. Instead, it is about the invention (or reinvention, in her case) of self.