FACT, Liverpool
Cinderella shuns her prince and Freudian sexism is unmasked in an empowering show about myth and misogyny
Fairytales are not known for complex female characters. Usually, they are beautiful but powerless, awaiting salvation via matrimony. Presumably wearied by the vacuous central female, several writers have penned disruptive alternatives. Red Riding Hood has been recast as the wolf’s lover by Angela Carter and the wolf’s murderer by Carol Ann Duffy, and Merseyside Women’s Liberation Movement when they rewrote several traditional tales in 1972. The same organisation saw Snow White unionise the dwarfs and Rapunzel escape using her own hair.
It is in this canon of subversive sisters that Ericka Beckman and Marianna Simnett’s protagonists find their place. Although their work is separated by nearly 30 years, both artists rally against the restrictive structure of myth, creating video works with strong, decisive women who forge their own destinies. Four of their films are currently exhibited at FACT along with Simnett’s installation Faint with Light, which captures the artist hyperventilating until she falls unconscious.
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