I use my emotions to fuel my art.

Introduction

Photocollage has long been used to create images of protest and satirical critique. From the anti-Nazi imagery of John Heartfield to the proto-feminist fantasy images of Grete Stern and Richard Hamilton’s famous parody of post-war consumerism ‘Just what is it that makes today’s homes so different, so appealing?’. In each, the technique allowed the artist to juxtapose pictorial elements to sharpen the incisive edge of irony and caricature malignant ideologies and behaviours.

For Hawai‘i-based artist Diana Nicholette Jeon, photocollage is often the starting point for her artmaking. Her images push back hard against the ideological and commercial misrepresentation of women that she witnesses in the USA. The counterfeit notions of ideal womanhood touted by media and advertising to create aspirations and anxieties that drive rampant consumerism and seek to justify the external control of female behaviours and bodies. Her collage process is complex and multilayered and, while these images speak to the wider state of society, they find their genesis in the personal.

Starting with self-portraiture, she digitally masks and cuts up the original photographs and arranges the fragments into new pictorial forms, digitally painting and drawing into the masked image pieces and onto layers in between. In some series, she prints a hard copy and works on the image with traditional materials such as pencil, pastel, and paint, sealing the final result under layers of encaustic medium. The hybridity of the resulting work lies not only in the recontextualising of image fragments and the mixing of media, but also in the way personal experience is fused with political polemic. Boldly, she transforms her external appearance into a visual metaphor of inner emotional dissent: the anger and frustration she feels when faced with the inequity she perceives. The result is, in the sense used in the arts, grotesque: evoking feelings of both discomfort and sympathy.

It takes courage to draw so openly on one’s personal life in order to speak to the tropes of societal injustice – and to do so by turning one’s own image into the allegorical grotesques she employs to personify those tropes. But then Diana Nicholette Jeon’s creative practice is as feisty as it is experimental.

Alasdair Foster

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© Diana Nicholette Jeon ‘Resistance Girl’ 2017 from the series ‘Self-Exposure’

Interview

What first drew you to experiment with the medium of photography?

My father was a sculptor who also took photographs; at the time, though, mostly of my sister and me. I used his old Brownie camera, then film point-and-shoots and disposables, later instant cameras and on through SLR to DSLR… Then toy cameras and on to cell phones, which are now my mainstay. I keep my old phones as each generation produces a specific look depending on the model’s technology. I use them the way people might change a lens on a traditional camera; to emphasise the look I want for the particular project.

I love toy cameras and film, but I would need a bigger budget and access to a darkroom to make work in that way. So, I modify the phones to re-create the look of a plastic-lens camera – shooting through things such as a translucent credit card or a Holga lens duct-taped to the phone. Of course, my gear looks pretty dopey with all the Command strips, duct tape, and cardboard tubing.

[Left] © Diana Nicholette Jeon ‘Not As Things Should Be Girl’ 2019 from the series ‘Self-Exposure’
[Right] © Diana Nicholette Jeon ‘I’m Not a Feminist! Girl’ 2017 from the series ‘Self-Exposure’

How did you develop your very distinctive mixed media approach to using those cell-phone images?

I’ve worked in digital mixed media and digital photocollage since the late nineties, but I haven’t had studio space or darkroom access since I left grad school in 2006. So, I am limited to creating with a camera, laptop, printer, cell phone, and whatever can be set up after my family leaves in the morning and torn down again before they return home for the day. It’s a challenge, but it is my life. I’ve adapted.

The advent of iPad Pro and the Apple Pencil gave me what I did not have working with a Wacom tablet in Photoshop: the ability to paint and draw on images as if they were prints. It was a relief not to be looking at the screen while having my hands somewhere to the side working on the tablet. Procreate [a raster graphics editing app] came out at the same time. I gravitated to using an iPad, Apple Pencil, and the digital painting and drawing tools in Procreate to modify my work.

Then, with the series ‘Self Exposure’, I printed and mounted each image onto wooden panels before altering it further using traditional media like oil sticks, pastels, and graphite, with multiple layers of encaustic medium encasing it.

[Left] © Diana Nicholette Jeon ‘No Means No Girl’ 2017 from the series ‘Self-Exposure’
[Right] © Diana Nicholette Jeon ‘Used And Abused Girl’ 2016 from the series ‘Self-Exposure’

How did that series begin?

I use my emotions to fuel my art. What usually starts me off on a project is an event or my reaction to life unfolding, including socio-political issues. In the case of ‘Self Exposure’, it was not a singular event but rather an accumulation of them over my lifetime. I was distressed by the portrayal of ‘ideal women’ in the media and the grossly unrealistic expectations that they set for our lives. There were just so many things I was ‘supposed to be’ … and was failing at. Each figure in the series speaks explicitly about what the idealised but unattainable ‘perfect American woman’ is expected to be.

How did the series develop over time?

‘Self-Exposure’ formed organically from that concern until I stopped working on the series in early 2016. I had become bored repeating the same processes over a long period and also felt I didn’t have anything relevant left to say. But then, in 2017, Trump was inaugurated, and the War on Women started in full force. At the time, I was on a one-month residency in the Oregon High Desert. My peers had zero interest in talking about what was happening. So, I took my emotions into the studio and made ten more digital photocollages expressing my feelings. At the end of the residency, I brought them home, printed and mounted them, and worked on them further with traditional media and wax.

The work expresses everything I was feeling. I was taking tons of self-portraits, digitally chopping them up, manipulating them, digitally painting on the image, and then putting it all back together. The glaring imperfections each contains became an expressive way through which to visualise the failure to measure up to those supposed ‘ideals’.

[Left] © Diana Nicholette Jeon ‘Hat’ 2016 from the series ‘Socially Speaking’
[Right] © Diana Nicholette Jeon ‘Cake’ 2016 from the series ‘Socially Speaking’

What prompted you to make ‘Socially Speaking’?

Working fine artists suffer the dreaded ‘nope’ all the time. We just have to develop thick skins and keep moving forward, seeking ‘yes’ like a shark hunting dinner. But there are days when something you thought you might get turns into a ‘nope’, and the organisers were not polite enough to let you know in advance. You find out through social media when you see exclamations of joy from friends who succeeded in the same endeavour. That’s so deflating, to discover your own failure at the very moment you have to give cheerful and heartfelt messages of congratulations to those who were successful. It leaves you with no time to adjust – to grieve a little before you put on your game face.

‘Socially Speaking’ flowed from having that happen to me a few too many times. Trying to muster that heartfelt happiness for someone else’s good fortune while simultaneously processing my own disappointment. And it all could have been avoided if organisers were humane enough to send an advance ‘We’re sorry…’ message.

[Left] © Diana Nicholette Jeon ‘Balloon’ 2016 from the series ‘Socially Speaking’
[Right] © Diana Nicholette Jeon ‘Popsicle’ 2016 from the series ‘Socially Speaking’

How did you go about depicting those feelings visually?

I used the metaphor of gifts one might give someone in celebration (while keeping one’s mouth shut so as not to make an untoward comment the person doesn’t deserve). The initial process was similar to that for ‘Self-Exposure’ in that I started with self-portraits, cut them up, and built a new me from the various pieces. I then composited additional photographs of celebratory things such as a party hat, a balloon, a cake…

One difference between these works and ‘Self-Exposure’ is that I chose to retain a more photographic style. Even though the backgrounds are painted, I wanted to minimise the apparent handcrafting, suggesting the sort of look you might get applying cyanotype or salt-process chemical mixes to paper.

[Left] © Diana Nicholette Jeon ‘Catfisher’ 2022 from the series ‘Toxic Tales’
[Right] © Diana Nicholette Jeon ‘Baiter’ 2022 from the series ‘Toxic Tales’

More recently, you returned to the theme of social media with your series ‘Toxic Tales’.

This is a longer-term work in progress, developed as situations occur. It is a commentary on the behaviours fostered online. Conceptualisation is at the heart of my practice. When I tackle a new project I ask myself: What do I need to do? What materials should I use? How should I present it? In this case, while using self-portraiture, compositing, and digital painting, I want to reflect on the way people portray themselves in the metaverse. Some of the roots of the series began with a bit of commentary buried within the ‘Self-Exposure’ series. And, while a few of those images obliquely address social media more generally, the real target of ‘Toxic Tales’ is the behaviour of specific individuals online, based on actual interactions. Because of this, the work maintains an intentional degree of ambiguity as I don’t want people to recognise themselves.

You use yourself in much of your work. Do you see these images primarily as personal (self-portraits, albeit psychological) or are you seeking a more universal sense of, say, the perspective of an everywoman?

They are both. They are self-portraits in the sense that I am the model and the emotions they discuss are my own. Still, they are also stand-ins for the experiences of many, if not most, American women and the way we find ourselves butting up against dominant societal expectations.

[Left] © Diana Nicholette Jeon ‘Incredulous’ 2022 from the series ‘Toxic Tales’
[Right] © Diana Nicholette Jeon ‘Claws-Out Troll’ 2022 from the series ‘Toxic Tales’

Do you think that living in Hawai‘i has given you a different perspective on the world from someone living in mainland USA?

Yes, but in a tempered way. It would be different if I were born in Hawai‘i. I was born in Massachusetts and lived and worked in California for a number of years. I came to Hawai‘i in 1995 and it has been my home for longer than anywhere else. My husband is a local who was born here on Oahu. Our mixed-race son was born and raised here. I have adapted and acclimatised.

Hawai‘i is very different from the other states. There is no white majority, and the largest population consists of Japanese American descendants of the Plantation Era contract workers. While technically I will never be local, I am inevitably influenced by the experience, mores, location, and people of these islands. The history of Hawai‘i and its culture have, for example, significantly impacted the way I look at colonisation and the romanticisation of ‘the other’. I certainly view things differently than if I had stayed on the mainland, including the way tourism has impacted the islands.

[Left] © Diana Nicholette Jeon ‘#58’ 2024 from the series ‘Damaged’
[Right] © Diana Nicholette Jeon ‘#19’ 2023 from the series ‘Damaged’

The images in ‘Damaged’ have an alchemical feel to them. How did this series begin?

Here, the emulsion is a stand-in for skin and the human psyche. I shot self-portraits and then used a Polaroid Lab [instant printer] to output them to Polaroid.

How did it begin? In 2018, my husband left our family for his mistress. He remained with her for 860 days. It was totally unexpected – a devastating, world-shattering, ego-debilitating shock. Traumatic. It took me a long time to heal from the betrayal, even after we were reconciled.

Did you find it therapeutic to make this work?

My artmaking practice, in general, is cathartic. I do a lot of work that delves into unpleasant experiences I have had in life. Psychological research suggests that when you remember a negative experience, your mind relives it. So while, to a large degree, it is therapeutic, it can also bring me back to experiencing the event again. Some cut more closely to the bone than others, and I have to be in the right frame of mind to work on those.

[Left] © Diana Nicholette Jeon ‘#54’ 2024 from the series ‘Damaged’
[Right] © Diana Nicholette Jeon ‘#9’ 2023 from the series ‘Damaged’

You have spent many years developing ways to use digital photocollage and digital post-production to create highly personal work. Recently, you have been exploring the use of AI. As an artist, what for you are the benefits and challenges of working with AI?

People call AI a lot of different things – some of them really silly. I refer to my AI work as AI-Mediated Post-Photography.

AI tools do not make anyone an artist, let alone a good artist, any more than having a camera makes someone a skilled photographer. There’s so much more to making art – the ideas, thought process, how you work with the tools, and the final manifestation. But what AI can help me do is create images that I don’t have other ways to make.

I still begin with my own photographs and photographic collages when using AI. As you can see in the series we have been discussing, much of my work involves extreme gesture. So, beginning with these images ensures an emotional and stylistic consistency when also using AI. And, because my AI-Mediated Post Photography work is edited in postproduction or composited with my photos for hybrid work, prompts – whether image, text, or both – are but a starting point. Just this week, I heard an artist who uses AI the way I do refer to her images as ‘constructions’. I think this is a good way to understand my AI-Mediated Post-Photography work. While not every image I make using AI is composited, they all start and end with my own photos and images. I select the ones I use as input based on the output I know will result, after which I work further on the image in postproduction.

AI is a controversial subject right now. Some feel it should remain quite separate from what is considered to be photography and others that it is simply the next stage in the development of a technology.

From the moment I started to use it, I have believed that AI would integrate to simply become part of the toolset for the medium it emulates. In my way of thinking, there is photo-styled AI, printmaking-styled AI, and so on. As soon as Adobe announced AI would be part of Photoshop, the writing was on the wall. I’ve been using Photoshop almost daily since 1997; I’ve seen its evolution and the way in which Adobe implements features that have been taken from one tool into another product. I truly believe that photo-styled AI will become part of the language of photography, whether some people like it or not.

[Left] © Diana Nicholette Jeon ‘No. 15’ 2024 from the series ‘CAKE’
[Right] © Diana Nicholette Jeon ‘No. 7’ 2024 from the series ‘CAKE’

‘CAKE’ is a series in which you have used AI within your broader hybrid process. What is ‘CAKE’ about?

In 1765, Rousseau coined the phrase ‘Let them eat cake’. Today, it refers to a frivolous disregard for another’s plight, like the way tone-deaf politicos and bogus court rulings have given way to the unthinkable: women being denied life-saving and compassionate reproductive care, endangering our lives and future childbearing abilities with the latter-day version of the ‘cake’ speech…

What year is this?

In this work, imaginary everywomen are engaged in the battle against these new and distressing societal restrictions, a visual testament to our hearts, minds, and untold stories of disenchantment.

[Left] © Diana Nicholette Jeon ‘No. 9’ 2024 from the series ‘CAKE’
[Right] © Diana Nicholette Jeon ‘No. 10’ 2024 from the series ‘CAKE’

How did you use AI in making this series?

When I started ‘CAKE’, Midjourney V5 had a new feature that allowed you to create personal styles. I used my own images as the prompts to create a data set for the AI to use as a style guide. Then, in post-production, I toned the images that were generated and made composites from some of them that included the use of my own photographs.

In making the bodies of work discussed here, what have you learned about yourself that you did not previously know?

For me, artmaking is a way to deal with my reactions to the world and events. Most especially, it is a way to work through the negative experiences of my life. I don’t know that I have learned anything about myself in the process; it is more a form of catharsis. It’s something I just need to do.

© Diana Nicholette Jeon ‘#47’ 2024 from the series ‘Damaged’

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She has garnered a range of awards. She was overall competition winner at the eleventh Julia Margaret Cameron Awards (2018); was a Juror’s Pick in the LensCulture Black & White Awards (2020); and was six times named in the Photolucida Critical Mass Top 200 (2017, 2018, 2019, 2022, 2023, 2024). In 2024, she won two silver awards at Prix de la Photographie Paris (PX3), a silver at Analog Sparks, and a gold at the Tokyo International Foto Awards. Diana Nicholette Jeon lives and works in Honolulu, Hawai‘i.

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This interview is a Talking Pictures original.

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