Disturbing Perfection: Valerie Belin’s Images of Living Mannequins
The moment I turned the corner on the bottom floor of the International Center of Photography, I was completely taken aback. The museum, which is in the middle of its third triennial event of photography and video, this time entitled “Dress Codes”, is filled with an enormous amount of defining portraits. In these collections of portraits, I found myself just seeing them for what they were—pictures. No photo distinctly captured my attention. No photo made me want to dissect the story it secretly held within its frame.Discouraged, I began to ease over each picture or series of pictures without giving any one much thought or consideration of emotional impact, that is, until I reached a back room of the center’s exhibit. Four photos, hugely framed, lay suspended on the wall, the only four that comprised it, each with one young adult photographed in the dead center. The series was entitled “Untitled (Models II), 2006” and was taken by photographer Valerie Belin. The moment I saw this series that represented a modernistic take on black and white photos, one thought came to mind: these four photos represent the coldest perfection I have ever seen. In fact, the perfection appeared so exact, the two boys and the two girls that comprised this series must have indeed been unreal. Because of this image, it seems appropriate to determine that it was far from accidental that Belin integrated the ideas of "perfection" and "unreal" into one series of art.
