The Wife, The Mistress and The Mannequin

Poppy Boon-Stokes

The Wife, The Mistress and The Mannequin is a set of portraits depicting film noir character types of women in the 20th century, whose identities were often condensed to their relationships with men or lack thereof. The narrative was inspired by one of Freud’s wild theories called ‘The Madonna-Whore Complex’, for which he wrote of men’s marital intimacy issues: "where men love they have no desire, and where they desire, they cannot love” so they need both a mistress and a wife. A story formed in my mind about the lives of these women and how they’d both end up.

---

 

---