Susan Joy Rippberger

Artist Statement

AN ETHNOGRAPHY OF SLIPS IN FILM
This ethnography analyzes the roles slips have played in films, questioning what they might say about the women who wear them, the society they lived in, and the constraints of their social theatre. This ethnographic study stems from a project began in 2008, based on the idea of slips as vestiges from 1950s/1960s Americana. I began working with slips as a sculptural medium, folded in piles, hanging knotted from hooks on the wall, or woven into grid-like sculptures. In live performances and short films I re-traced the ritual process of preparing and embodying the slip, exploring themes of private and public dress.