Kaitlyn Sandvik
Arts, Entertainment, and Technology Editor
@ksandvikcourant
Toronto’s homegrown photographer, part time filmmaker, and frequent contributor to Rookie Magazine, Petra Collins, is a master of expression through all mediums at her disposal. She manages The Arduous, an all-female art collective which explores the elusive nature of female adolescence and the perverse idolization of the young physical form in mainstream media. Her art often presents a culturally diverse mosaic of girls in typical situations to emphasize the monotony of routines placed upon our female youth by enforced cultural norms. Petra attempts to dismantle the patriarchy through her images and moving pictures as a contribution to the progression of third wave feminism’s narrative.
Her aeipathy for creating art fosters the fluid unit that is young female America. Petra flirts with the controversial while critiquing the modern consumerist avarice bombarding the public. Approaching the feminine mystique during a time of turbulent social reform is a task that she embraces. Her images commonly display women with body hair that is unshaved and play upon the historical fear of liberally clad or progressive women as witches. Petra’s subjects and muses retain a natural aura that provides a sense of grit and reality which young readers of Rookie Magazine can relish in.
A recurring theme within her work is the exploration of the warped popular worship of the teenage girl and her developing body. The theories below the surface are multifaceted and feature not only a commentary on the corrupted dehumanization of the female form but the hypocrisy that exists with this idolization of bodies as objects for sexual purposes and the consequences of slut shaming. When girls enter puberty, a new realm of relationships and expectations appear to them and the damaging shackles of the alpha-male mentality and girl on girl hate can be blamed for the maze-like world that young girls must decipher. The issue of internalized sexism and misogyny is something her art tries to combat. Petra captures it all with daring and bold works that trigger reflection on why certain images of female youth provoke varying reactions and why a double standard exists in the attitude that is held towards the “acceptable” way for women to act.
There is juxtaposition of the early developmental stages of a girls life and her mysterious teenage years. The movement from what is labeled as period of innocence and purity, a stage full of pretty dolls forced into her hands and tiaras placed upon her head metamorphosizes into a strange reality of catcalls and the fear that no matter how a girl decides to dress or act, she simply cannot win. If she wears makeup then she is giving into societal beauty standards and if she doesn’t, she simply won’t be pretty enough. “Pretty” is a word that girls learn to strive for before they can understand that they do not have to please anyone other than themselves in order to be beautiful. Petra often shows the power and confidence of girls in photos for Rookie but also captured the raw challenges some might face in order to love themselves in her video series.
Petra mimics the nostalgic disposable film age that this generations youth grew up with using drugstore 35 mm color film. Within her photos, Petra often captures the presence of technology in our everyday lives as a means to boost the fragile adolescent ego, a purposeful dichotomy between the old and new that is undoubtedly accessible.
Petra’s aesthetic is as ethereal as it is ponderous, from girls decked in norm-core and school girl outfits experimenting with 80s eyeshadow, to images presenting questions about the transition of a teenage girl and her subjection to archaic expectations. Her photographs can display the addiction to rebellion in teens that can fester in strict households, a notion explored in The Virgin Suicides which contains parallel themes and stylistic choices. There appears to be a coalition of modern artistic works emerging that have a concentration on the beautiful recklessness of young girls responding to what is expected of them and includes strong undertones of the undying hunger for a return to childhood and to escape from the competitive modern world.
Petra uses girls from a multitude of backgrounds with diverse appearances, hailing from urban areas to middle America suburbia. She is able to capture the essence of raging hormones and the frustration that exists within all those deemed outsiders in high school due to their orientation, creed, color, interests etc. Her inspiration to create work that sometimes comforts and sometimes disturbs was from Ryan McGinley, a prominent artist in the New York City downtown scene who had notable pals like Dan Colen and Dash Snow. Ryan, like Petra unabashedly tackles nudity, and his work was the catalyst for Petra to understand the beauty her own body possessed.
It is worth contemplating that Petra presents nude subjects in a manner that is respectful and intends to provoke wonder and awe for the beauty of the natural human figure. However, in the works Petra creates revolving around teenage girls and revealing clothing, the mood alters into a conflicting reflection of the contradictory world we live in. It delves deeper into the risk girls face with embracing their entire body with confidence and facing judgement for their choices in whether to free the nipple or even to done shorts in hot temperatures. But Petra still manages to raise the question of why we praise the sexualized body but are afraid of blatant natural bareness.
While Petra’s primary ventures are in photography, she recently worked on a short documentary style film series, played around with paint and sculpture mediums, and created Strange Magic in Space 15 Twenty. Strange Magic was an instillation Petra collaborated on with The Arduous and Tavi Gevinson of Rookie. The piece is a teen girls bedroom, the ultimate mystical place which encases the shrines of our punk gods and depicts a clash between childhood relics and the discovery of new interests. The room features pastel colors and a muted palette with Simon & Garfunkel records as well as diaries and doodles of awkward first encounters with what is growing up in girlhood. Strange Magic truly encapsulates the ethos behind all the thought provoking work that Petra does; she attempts to release the female spirit from oppression, comment on the backwards elements of our society, and to capture the beauty in our stumbling first attempts at maturing.
