Subject Not Object

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Karen Klassen, “Nope,” 2019

oil on panel, 30” x 24”

Karen Klassen's portraits have great titles. 

You Look So Pretty When You Smile pops me back to my university days when an old  maintenance guy in the elevator of one of the science buildings instructed me to smile. 

Klassen, who is chatting with me about her show, I Am Not Here For Your Amusement, at Calgary’s Christine Klassen Gallery from May 11 to June 29, doesn’t miss a beat.

“How annoying is that,” she says.

It's not surprising that another of her titles is Subject Not Object.

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Karen Klassen, “Subject Not Object,” 2019

oil on panel, 24” x 24”

I was hoping things had changed for younger women, but Klassen has fielded the same sort of patronizing comments that I did. 

And, of course, the recent outpouring of anger via the #MeToo movement underlines that there's still plenty of room for improvement. 

“I’m a happy person," says Klassen, who is not related to the gallery’s owner. "But I started to feel very troubled and just really upset.”

She had assumed societal attitudes towards women were moving forward, but suddenly wasn’t so sure. It prompted her to start a series of paintings that show women's strength, but also reveal other aspects of their personalities.

“We’re lots of things,” she says. “We’re strong and we’re tender. We’re loving and we’re talented and capable and all those things. But in this body of work, I wanted to show strength in particular.”

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Karen Klassen, “Not Your Trophy,” 2019

oil on panel, 16” x 12”

Some of the women she paints bare their flesh and sport tattoos, the way young women often do nowadays. While none are nude, a favourite terrain of the male gaze throughout much of art history, Klassen does portray women as sexual beings.

Her works create an interesting tension for anyone old enough to remember judgments around women who dress provocatively or are sexually assaulted. 

We now live in a world of selfies, social media and shifting gender. Men and non-binary folks sometimes complain of being objectified. The politics around representations of women's bodies and, to some extent, all bodies, have become more complex.

Klassen, who trained as an illustrator and now teaches at the Alberta University of the Arts in Calgary, says men and women need each other. 

“We are sexual people,” she says. “We are vulnerable. We are soft, but we are strong. I didn’t want to pretend that we weren’t those things and just represent us as armour-wearing ball-busters. It’s not about hating men … I have so many wonderful men in my life that are as feminist as I am, which is really great.” ■

I Am Not Here For Your Amusement is on view at the Christine Klassen Gallery in Calgary from May 11 to June 29, 2019.