The Los Angeles-based gallery, Chimento Contemporary will be presenting the work of Allie Pohl ’07 in their Side Gallery from Nov. 5 - Dec. 17. Pohl, a conceptual artist, created her signature Ideal Woman series.
Pohl created Ideal Woman by digitally enhancing the Barbie doll to fit Western society’s ideal female measurements: 36-24-36. In doing so, she satirizes Barbie’s already unrealistic proportions. The avatar shown here symbolizes anti-perfection; this is a recurring theme throughout her work, in diverse mediums such as sculpture, video, ceramic and installation.
Through her artistic creations, Pohl addresses the socially constructed idea of perfection and the unrealistic demands on women’s bodies. California-based writer Arden Shore remarked, “The artist behind the Ideal Woman series empowers women through her art.”
Indeed, Pohl commented, “It is a reminder that you are the ideal woman—perfectly imperfect.”
Pohl also has an Ideal Woman Crush campaign which is a small complement to her art series. In this campaign, she says, “Every week I write about a woman I am crushing on and in return I ask that woman to write about a woman she is proud of. No one, man or woman, can accomplish their dreams alone.”
Whatever project she is focusing on, be it photographing her underwear between her knees in bathroom stalls for her Hot Seat series or dissecting male-bodied mannequins to emphasize the evolution of the socially constructed ideal of the male form in her Peacocking series, she challenges archaic and oppressive attitudes about gender.
At Hamilton, Pohl majored in communication and was a member of the chess club, Lambda Pi Eta and women’s tennis.
