External v internal – the battle within by art critic Michaela Hall

External v internal – the battle within

We all have secret parts of ourselves or our lives that we like to keep concealed. We have routines and places where the conflict of our external self vs internal self comes into play and we choose what we present to the world or the people we are with. With social media now a major part of our lives, this is a battle we have to conquer each day, how much do we choose to give away and how much do we keep private – some prefer to share everything whilst others prefer to sit quietly in the background. All points towards the dilemma of the external v internal – something which is explored in many different artists work in varying ways.

British conceptual artist Gillian Wearing CBE is well known for playing with the idea of what we are thinking vs what we are saying in her works. Often, we see subjects in her works in juxtapositions of power and vulnerability. This is especially true of her 2009 piece ‘Secrets and Lies’.  For this project the artists called out for participants online who wanted to bare all about themselves, without having to technically show their face. Those who came forward with their confessions or thoughts they wanted to reveal were then recorded – wearing very extreme disguises like masks and wigs that conceal their true identities. Viewers invited into the space could experience this clashing experience of raw inner truths with ‘characters’ that they could not place. The experience creates a conversation about safe spaces and what makes us feel comfortable to share – a debate about the internal and external and how they come together in everyday life.

(Image courtesy of Gillian Wearing, buffaloakg.org for educational purposes)

Another artist courageously playing with this conversation is American artist and mental health advocate Cristi López. In her work López seeks to show that the internal deserves to be shared and that we all have our own battles which should be spoken about without fear. She has admitted in interviews that she herself suffers with obsessive compulsive disorder and intrusive thoughts and in a 2023 exhibition named ‘Unravel: Portraits of my obsessions’ she explored her own relationship with her mental health through a series of beautifully emotive and soft yet dramatic paintings. In ‘Unravel’ we see the subject in a beautiful yet vulnerable twisted stance, she is nude and has pills and scissors attached to her, suggesting an element of struggle or battle alongside the more traditional beauty stance. Similarly, in ‘Self-reassurance’ we see the subject staring at her reflection in the mirror, which along with the tittle, provokes ideas of self-confidence vs self-doubt, a visual meeting of the internal and external.

(‘Unravel’ 2023 and ‘Self-reassurance’ 2023, both images courtesy of https://www.cristilopezart.com/2023 )  

Both artists explore the power of presentation in their works and how we choose to present the internal or external, it’s a complex conversation that each artist and individual will have their own approach to, but it’s something that most of us will identify with when viewing their works. The idea of the two halves of ourselves and the conscious decision around if we externalise the internal is something we are increasingly exposed to in everyday life and something which I suspect will continue to fuel courageous and thought provoking works for decades to come.