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This aspect of an object of daily use has fascinated artists to this day:
1800 years ago the courtesans of Alexandria wore sandals in whose footprint
on soft ground one could read: FOLLOW ME!
2800 years ago the ancient Iranian horse-warriors of Luristan drank narcotic
drugs from clay boots.
In Europe, up until the last century, the bridal shoe was kept after the
wedding night as a guaranty for fertility, in the graceful ladies’
mule a direct reference to intimacy and eroticism was seen.
Already the material develops a sensual, not rarely an animal aura, for
example, when Curt Stenvert well-formed female legs are tightly encased
in black leather. But the exchanging of the usual materials, like shoes
made of sheet metal, lures our imagination into the surreal areas of dream
and the subconscious.
The playing with gender roles can also throw off balance, when men in
high heels signal danger and vulnerability at the same time, or when a
phallic stele with ballerina shoes shifts the polarity between masculine
and feminine into a ritual sphere. |
