Stephanie Todhunter
The Lost Girls (the main characters from the Latchkey Kid Project) draw on motifs common to American Midwest childhood during the 1970s/80s as much as they do on current events. Such motifs include isolation, stranger danger, missing children, parental neglect, satanic panic, as well as contemporary feminism and pop culture (body dis-morphia, second/third/fourth wave feminism and cancel culture). Combining and re-processing existing social constructs gives rise to results that are both transformed and transforming.
I build, photograph, print and paint. It is extremely important to me to have complete control and execute all steps during the process with my own hands. All aspects of image capture and printmaking are done in my studio with easily accessible materials. I balance this need for rigorous control by using intermediary techniques and materials to introduce uncertainty into the process, with unpredictable results. My work is a balance between chaos and control, between rebellion and conformity. I rip, sand, scrape, draw, paint-over, assemble and dismember until I reach a point where any addition or subtraction is no longer necessary. Nothing is ever completely destroyed and nothing is ever really finished. What is always consistent within my work is the narrative of the Lost Girls.
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