Eve and the Virgin Mary are the two primary female figures visualized in the history of Western art. Eve’s signifying element is her shameful nudity, while the Virgin Mary is represented as a paragon of virtue—clothed, almost bodiless, translucently white. Art historian Margaret Miles writes, “[Eve’s] naked body . . . signals her sinfulness just as the Virgin’s lack of body reveals her goodness.” St. Irenaeus in the second century was the first to name the Virgin Mary as the “second Eve,” claiming that Mary’s act of giving birth to Jesus reversed Eve’s fall and would lead to the salvation of humankind. These depictions, all made by men, were the lens through which women were expected to understand themselves.

With a large-format camera, I photograph women modeling as both Eve and the Virgin Mary in reference to particular images in art history, primarily from the late Middle Ages and Renaissance. Each subject chooses the image they want to reference and we collaborate to make the portraits. In a similar way to how the original artists extrapolated these biblical narratives and placed them within a contemporary setting, I photograph each woman in their own space. These portraits draw on the long history of feminist performative photography, from Julia Margaret Cameron and Claude Cahun to Deana Lawson and Justine Kurland.

By placing real women into these mythical roles, I explore the ways in which the categories of shame and virtue continue to be inscribed onto women’s bodies in the contemporary West.