Analysis Of Mickalene Thomas 'Sleep: Deux Femmes Noire'

Artist: Mickalene Thomas
Work: Sleep: Deux Femmes Noires, 2011 mixed media collage 23.75 x 31.25 inches (paper) 60.3 x 79.4 cm 31.25 x 39 inches (framed) 79.4 x 99.1 cm LM15222 In this piece Mickalene Thomas challenges not only how beauty is typically represented but she also challenges the heterosexual normative. Beautiful images of nature are cut, torn, and collaged over one another with a portrait of two African American women romantically embracing each other placed dead center. These women are clearly embracing each other romantically and their embrace showcases their bodies in such a natural state that would never be shown in mediums such as mainstream magazines. What I mean by this is their skin is folded, "fat" is shown, and they
It represents the struggle and the unwilling detachment of African-American women that belong to the LGBT community from society. While Helguera describes artists that believe that targeting an audience before the piece actually detracts from the piece 's freedom, in this case I need to seriously contemplate what community would be best to target. I want to target a community that African-American women within the LGBT realm are integrated within yet disconnected from. I wouldn 't want to choose a community that does not normally encounter LGBT African-American women and on the other hand I would not want to choose a community in which LGBT African-American women are fully accepted either. So let 's say that Community X exists and there 's a lot of unacknowledged prejudice within this community surrounding LGBT African-American women. I would enter the community and start a dialogue with a local organization that these women belong to and are involved in. I would spend a couple of days talking to the women who are willing to participate and are outspoken about their experiences within the community to gather what exactly it is that they 're struggling with. How do people treat them? Why do they feel people treat that way. Is it because they 're African American? Is it because they belong to the LGBT community? Is it
One the one hand they’re hearing the women previously interview talk about their struggles within the community and how this makes them feel. On the other, they’re physically faced by the women putting up a piece of art that presents what some in the community might consider wrong or at least not something they would care to look at. The goal here is not to entice the audience to come to like the piece. It is simply the act of self-reflexivity and questioning the way they treat these women that are a part of their community. The idea is that they’re confronted with something that they’re uncomfortable with (the piece), then they put a real face to the subject of the piece (the women), and on top of that they’re confronted with the women’s struggles and feelings (the