Cindy Sherman's Untitled Film Still Analysis

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“Cindy Sherman’s Untitled Film Still #21” Amra Causevic Photography In American Society November 6, 2014 Known for her character impersonating self portraits in which she depicts a variety of characters which features female stereotypes in various social and cultural roles1, where she is both the subject and photographer. Cindy Sherman, was born in Glen Ridge New Jersey in 1954. She grew up living a portion of her youth in Huntington Long Island where she adopted a fascination for film at the very early age. “I was always glued to the television. I remember stumbling across bizarre futuristic film that was made up of nothing but still images except for one of a final scenes, which moved: it was Chris Marker’s ‘La Jetée’.”2…show more content…
Seldom, did she have help. In addition, these moments which she captures were of identities frozen by a gaze of women waiting, wanting, searching, expressing fright and anxiety, postures eluding to the past and future, and where firmly opened to interpretation, as art critic Arthur C. Danto puts it ‘she is the girl that condenses the myths that define life’s expectation in Middle American fantasy, and we all know her story.’9 Moreover, these were photographs of constructed identities, elaborate props, costumes, and settings -- photographs of young house wives, battered women, students, Southern Bells, lovers, etc. Sherman creates a voyeuristic tendency in these stills, engaging and seducing the viewer to create his or her interpretation, one particularly being “Untitled Film Still #21”.10 Here, we see a young woman in a suit surrounded by conglomeration of buildings looking upwards with an ambiguous gaze; as the camera angle is slightly tilted below her, thus allowing the subject to appear superior. She appears larger, almost to suggest a hopeful feminist perspective as she can be greater as the buildings surrounding her, buildings which symbolize a phallocratic society. The obscurity of the title
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