(“Modern Day Bibles.” Art Installation for “SOME PEOPLE” by Erika Dufour.)
We are constantly inundated with ways to “better” ourselves, our health, our bodies, our attitudes, our lives, with great expectation to be more elevated, or “shredding,” or living a TED Talk kind of life.
“Self-Help” books are modern-day Bibles which we are expected to live by, guided by self-proclaimed gurus who proclaim if we follow their doctrines, we will have better, thinner, sexier, happier, healthier, fuller lives.
This series of art examines the effects of these modern-day Bibles and how they psychologically create the opposite effect of what is toted. The initial exhilaration these shiny new books of hope purport—that they will take away the sadness, the discontent, and the challenges of life away—is soon supplanted with disappointment and shame every time you/I/we glance at the pile of Self-Help books that claim they will better your health and improve your life.
My process has been creating head forms and masks out of the pages of destroyed Self-Help books by stitching them together using medical stitching, thus mimicking the rudimentary and suffocating effects of false, unattainable hopes and incessantly attempting to remake oneself through other people’s words, expecations and directives.
The process of destroying Self-Help books has brought me great joy and satisfaction. This process has led me to accept that I sometimes feel “screwed up,” like a “failure,” regular, or not epic…and maybe that’s just fine.
I feel I get more benefits from destroying Self-Help books than I would from reading them.
I find this work to be an important way of examining our relationship to ourselves and our false expectations of grandeur and silver bullets.
ABOUT
Erika DuFour is one of the premiere commercial, fashion, style, product and studio photographers in Chicago. She is a multifaceted artist and creates art using an array of methods and unexpected forms. Follow Erika @erika_dufour > View her art and commission her here.
