User:FutureArtHistorian

 'Stereo Styles'' by Lorna Simpson consists of ten Polaroid pictures placed on engraved plastic. This piece was created in 1988 and is currently located in a private collection. The ten individual images focus exclusively on the back of a young black woman’s head. Each image, all shot in black and white, shows the young woman modeling different hairstyles that would have been popular in the era. Accompanying these ten photos is ten descriptive words place on a thin black strip, written in white cursive. Simpson has added more depth and emotion to this piece by creating a drop shadow under each individual photograph.

Artist Background
Lorna Simpson is a feminist photographer from Brooklyn, New York whose subject matter solely focuses on young African American women. Simpson’s works convey political messages that touch the controversial subjects of racism and sexism in modern America. She is noted for her tendency to not put a face to her subject as a political message.To take it one step further she adds either empowering or degrading words to compliment the photos. This technique is referred to as an anti-portrait, an artwork that simultaneously engages with and resists traditional portraiture. Her practices are meant to convey powerful messages, to “allude to grapple with portraits of the past [and] to reimagine black women’s places in the visual dimensions of the American symbolic order.”

Advertisement and Personality
Simpson is successful in creating a powerful piece out of Stereo Styles from the seriousness of the black and white to the undertone of sarcasm in the descriptive words written in the center. Through her layout and representation of the young woman in the ten photos, there are two views of what the core meaning of Simpson’s work is meant to convey. The first is the similarities of the layout to cosmetic advertisements used in the 1980s. By using the advertisement format her piece transforms simple hairstyles into individual personalities through the use of photography and descriptive words. The words in the center of the composition include ‘Daring,’ ‘Sensible,’ ‘Severe,’ ‘Long and Silky,’ ‘Boyish,’ ‘Ageless,’ ‘Silly, ‘Magnetic,’ ‘Country Fresh,’ and ‘Sweet.’

Chronology of Physical Treatment
It is also thought that the ten different hairstyles represent a chronology that correlates to changes in physical condition and treatment. This layout is important to note particularly because black women were not being used in advertisement, especially for the hairstyles or personality traits that made them unique. Similarly, the public was not avidly following the African American movement, making the transformation of hairstyles a message to society that things are beginning to change. Through both the transformative hairstyles and playful descriptors, a suggestion of black women’s efforts to make it in the professional work world shines through. It is made evident that although this piece is meant to empower young black women to succeed in modern America, Simpson’s emphasis on racial controversies still yearn to make society aware of these efforts