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Juno Calypso

British photographer that makes self-portraits From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

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Juno Calypso (born 1989) is a British photographer.[1] Her self-portraits are personal works about feminism, isolation, loneliness and being self-sufficient.[2][3][4] Working alone, Calypso has made highly stylised photographs of herself whilst dressed as a fictional alter-ego, "Joyce", in unusual surroundings.[5] She also works as a commercial photographer.

Calypso was joint winner of the British Journal of Photography International Photography Award in 2016. In 2018 she received the Vic Odden Award from the Royal Photographic Society.

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Life and work

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Calypso was born in Hackney, London in 1989.[6][7] She gained an Art Foundation Diploma from Chelsea College of Arts (University of the Arts London) in 2008[8] and a BA in Photography from London College of Communication (University of the Arts London) in 2012.[9]

For her personal work, working alone Calypso has photographed highly stylised[10] self-portraits of herself whilst costumed as a fictional alter-ego, "Joyce",[11][12] a "bored, frustrated, lonely housewife of her imagination",[13] in unfamiliar, unusual and over-the-top surroundings.[5][14]

For her series Joyce, Calypso photographed herself in various hotel rooms.[15][16] The work is about the "oppressive elements of femininity", its "restrictive beauty regimes and modern rituals of seduction".[17] She has said "I'm trying to make a perfect photograph of a woman trying to create a perfect vision of herself."[17]

In The Honeymoon series, she photographed herself alone in an American couples-only honeymoon resort.[3][5][18] Nell Frizzell wrote in The Guardian that "there is a sense of airless claustrophobia about much of Calypso’s work. But in the Honeymoon Hotel pictures, that frustration is twinned with loneliness."[13] Alexandra Genova wrote in Time that her "work is a delicate dance between comedy and despair."[4]

Calypso has said:

I used to take pictures of Joyce as a way of making a critique on the laboured construction of femininity, but now I’m starting to see that the problem isn’t the make-up and bizarre body improvement devices, but the way society treats women who invest so deeply in their appearance."[18]

She also works as a commercial photographer.[10]

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Publications with contributions by Calypso

  • The Catlin Art Guide: New Artists in the UK. Catlin Holdings, 2013. By Justin Hammond. ISBN 978-0956457035.
  • It's Nice That Annual. London: It's Nice That, 2013.
  • Mossless 4: Public/Private/Portrait. Brooklyn, NY: Romke Hoogwaerts; New York: International Center of Photography, 2016. ISBN 978-0692712399.
  • Girl on Girl: Art and Photography in the Age of the Female Gaze. London: Laurence King, 2017. By Charlotte Jansen. ISBN 978-1780679556.[19]
  • Firecrackers: Female Photographers Now. London: Thames & Hudson, 2017. By Fiona Rogers and Max Houghton. ISBN 978-0500544747.
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Short films

  • The Linda Evans Rejuvenique Facial Toning System (2012)
  • Empty Pleasures (2012)
  • The Making of Joyce (2014)
  • The Honeymoon Suite (2015)

Awards

Solo exhibitions

  • Artist of the Day, selected by Tom Hunter, Flowers Gallery, London, 2015[26]
  • 71a Presents: Juno Calypso, 71a Gallery, London, October 2015[27]
  • What to Do with a Million Years, TJ Boulting, London, May–June 2018;[28][29][30] Studio Giangaleazzo Visconti, Milan, Italy, 2018/2019[31]

See also

References

External links

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