LAUGHING WHILE 2020 -
Laughing While Ascending proposes a joyous alternative to lost girls’ whereabouts. It is the latest in one of Halls’ most renowned series of paintings, ‘Laughing While,’ 2012 onwards. The series typically depicts women engaged in transgressive acts that interrogate encultured norms around femininity. These women are always active subjects, often breaking propriety just by eating messily, causing damage, or laughing out loud. Halls cites Hélène Cixous’ retelling of the Chinese general Sun Tse ‘who decapitates a group of women he is trying to train as soldiers, so disconcerted, so disgusted is he by their persistent laughter and refusal to take his orders seriously. This resonates with me deeply. Acts of political resistance come in many forms and when I paint images of women laughing, eating, reclining, reading, or simply looking, I am always cognisant of the fact that the most seemingly innocuous actions can be subversive.’39
The work’s title contains multiple meanings: “ascending” is literal; an action that requires physical
and mental effort. It evokes Ascension – holy figures carried to heaven by angels – but this trio is far too full of life to be dead; though maybe their enforced circumstances have been transcended. There’s also an implication in “ascending” of that invisible social ladder. One ascends in importance. Perhaps, as Halls has suggested, these girls embody the hopes their parents held when they embarked on their journeys: that one generation’s struggle will benefit future generations.40 And also the fears. Praise for this risk-taking behaviour – seeking to climb higher still, or sitting, hands thrown up in the air in magical balancing acts – is too often reserved for boys. Something Berthe Morisot intuited in her painting In the apple tree, 1890.
It has been said that if you’re lost, you should climb a tree. High up, you’ll have an overview of your terrain, the better to orient yourself. But this advice has been debunked. Climb a tree, and apparently all you’ll see are more treetops. Worse, you may fall, as few uppermost branches are strong enough to support an adult’s weight. The girls in Laughing while Ascending are certainly high, high up. Above the mist, playing gleefully while the sun rises. Perhaps they’ve been playing through the night. Safe from whatever adult chaos and danger await below.
Marie-Anne Mancio - Catalogue Essay - Lost Girls
Laughing While Ascending was exhibited in
LOST GIRLS, Flowers Gallery, London 2023