Middlesex University Research Repository An open access repository of Middlesex University research http://eprints.mdx.ac.uk Hatherley, Frances (2017) Sublime dissension: A working-class Anti-Pygmalion aesthetics of the female grotesque. PhD thesis, Middlesex University. [Thesis] Final accepted version (with author’s formatting) This version is available at: https://eprints.mdx.ac.uk/23204/ Copyright: Middlesex University Research Repository makes the University’s research available electronically. Copyright and moral rights to this work are retained by the author and/or other copyright owners unless otherwise stated. The work is supplied on the understanding that any use for commercial gain is strictly forbidden. A copy may be downloaded for personal, non-commercial, research or study without prior permission and without charge. 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See also repository copyright: re-use policy: http://eprints.mdx.ac.uk/policies.html#copy Sublime Dissension: A Working-Class Anti-Pygmalion Aesthetics of the Female Grotesque A Thesis submitted to Middlesex University in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Frances Hatherley Middlesex University Department of Visual Arts, Faculty of Arts and Creative Industries August 2017 1 Abstract This thesis reclaims and refigures negative stereotypical images of working-class femininity, proposing an “Anti-Pygmalion” aesthetics (referencing Shaw’s Pygmalion) in which pressure to conform to bourgeois notions of respectability is refused in favour of holding onto aspects of working-class female identity which have been treated as faulty and shameful. It examines a previously under-theorised dimension of the “female grotesque”: its formation under a process of classed construction. Contesting the disavowal of class identity in much art writing, I explore how it shapes art reception, showing how images of the Anti-Pygmalion female grotesque can provoke sublime experiences in viewers who share an empathetic connection with the work’s presentation of class difference. Against Enlightenment aesthetic theories which associate the sublime with the lofty, this thesis conceptualises it from the perspective of working-class women, connecting it with an excitement and awe that comes from below and bursts up and out. My approach is auto-ethnographic, drawing on my experiences as a woman from a working-class background to deepen my readings and address gaps in the field. To counter the erasure of working-class artists, I focus on work by working-class British artists and filmmakers from the 1980s – 2000s. Exploring the problematic experiences of working-class artists and writers in the institutional spaces of education and the art world, I highlight the resulting internalisation of stigmatised subjectivities. This frames my analysis of three case studies, each addressing aspects of working-class femininity: Jo Spence’s Class-Shame series, the photographs collected in Richard Billingham’s Ray’s a Laugh, and Carol Morley’s film The Alcohol Years. My analysis builds up a dialogue around Anti-Pygmalion aesthetics which forces a reconsideration of the categories of the sublime and the grotesque in the light of working-class identities and creativities, dispelling stereotypes which have hampered existing criticism, and reframing working-class stories and lives as significant and valuable. 2 Acknowledgements Thanks first and foremost to my inspiring and staunch feminist supervisors Katy Deepwell and Hilary Robinson, whose support, understanding and example encouraged me to produce the best work I could. Thanks to Middlesex University for funding three years of research. I’m grateful to Anne Massey and Catherine Dormor, who separately encouraged me to write in my own voice and to put myself into the research. Thanks go to Terry Dennett, and Carol Morley for taking the time to talk to me about their work. Thanks to Patrizia di Bello at The Jo Spence Memorial Library at Birkbeck for keeping Spence’s legacy alive, and for providing me with an ongoing research home. During my BA I benefited from the support and encouragement of teachers and mentors from Queen Mary University of London, in particular Sue Harris, Will McMorran, Lucy Bolton and Elza Adamovich, who provided me with the base of positive experience from which I was then able to take on the challenge of starting a PhD. Thanks to Klara Hallen for support and friendship during much of this time. Thanks to my brother Owen Hatherley, for a lifetime of conversations about class, and for helpful feedback on this project. Thanks to my father Steve Hatherley for being an inspiring example of the tradition of working-class intellectual autodidactism. Thanks to James and Liz Hatherley for always rooting for me. Special thanks to Paul Frankl, Chloe Adams, Florence Harvey, Pippa Selby and Stef Jewitt for endlessly believing in me. Love and gratitude to my patient husband Dominic Fox for keeping me going during the difficult parts of doing this work, and for proof-reading the thesis, being my sounding board and best comrade. Dedication Dedicated in gratitude, love and respect to my mother Maggie Fricker, without whose unfailing strength, encouragement and support this thesis would not have been possible. 3 Table of Contents Abstract ....................................................................................................................................... 2 Acknowledgements................................................................................................................... 3 Dedication ................................................................................................................................ 3 Illustrations .............................................................................................................................. 7 Introduction................................................................................................................................. 8 The Pygmalion .......................................................................................................................... 8 Historiography ........................................................................................................................ 11 Phenomenology and Subject Position ...................................................................................... 13 Auto-Ethnographic Approaches ............................................................................................... 16 A Conception of Class as a Political “Structure of Feeling” ......................................................... 17 The Case Studies ........................................................................................................................ 18 Jo Spence ............................................................................................................................... 19 Richard Billingham .................................................................................................................. 19 Carol Morley........................................................................................................................... 20 Chapter One: Methodologies, Concepts and Frameworks............................................................ 22 Women, Class, The Grotesque and The Sublime ....................................................................... 22 The Grotesque ........................................................................................................................ 23 The Female Grotesque ............................................................................................................ 26 A Feminist Sublime ................................................................................................................. 28 Chapter Two: Working-Class Stories Matter ................................................................................ 36 Theories of Class ..................................................................................................................... 36 The Turn Away from Class ....................................................................................................... 37 Identity Politics ................................................................................................................... 37 Categories of Working-Class Meaning ...................................................................................... 38 Subjective Experiences of Having a Working-Class Identity .......................................................