Drea Cofield Slows Down The Selfie
Cofield's decision to process fast images in an unhurried manor demonstrates the inate value of the self documenting subject: the moment in which she decides to press the camera button on her phone, commerating herself in privacy, and that these moments, though they signify the everyday, are unique and truthful in their swiftness. As the world keeps spinning, the days undulating, a selfie can be proof of life. Cofield's focus on "the tension between the disposable immediacy of digital imaging and the slowness, vulnerability, and physicality of painting" is a necessary study in the rapid world we live in. The sentiment of it is something I assess to be in tune with Hito Steyerl's In Defense of the Poor Image - a handbook for sincere consumption.
When someone takes a selfie, they have agency over their subjecthood. Cofield honors each subject in her re-rendering - aligning with their agency and consent - while simultaneously re-wiring dynamics common in art history where an often voiceless subject is depicted by a male painter. One could argue the fast nature of a selfie hinders its true value as visual evidence of existence, but Cofield leans into this, disagrees, and brings the imagery into a space of extreme value by painting it. Moving past the airbrushed shine of a perfect selfie, Cofield anchors these subjects in normalcy, inviting relatability and empathy by also depicting the humanizing belongings of each subject, like carton of dairy-free milk.
The depiction of different postures and distances separates Soft Exchanges from clear sexualization of a feminine body - rather the work demonstrates abstraction of the expectations projected onto them. The title itself signifies this as well: there's an exchange that occurs between the subject and viewer, the subject and Cofield - and this one is soft: it embraces vulnerable truth while stating over and over again that one has the right to be seen autonomously.
