Artist Patty Carroll addresses identity, belonging and home through drapery pictures

The Indiana University Northwest campus and the greater Northwest Indiana community are invited to view a photography exhibit by Chicago artist Patty Carroll, entitled, “Anonymous Women: Cloaking the Self.”

Chicago artist Patty Carroll photographs women under cloth in front of fabric of the same color or pattern, so the women become part of the background, losing their identities.

When Carroll moved with her husband to England, she explains, she experienced this loss of identity. She felt she was no longer the artist Patty Carroll, but “Mrs. Jones, wife of . . .” Women who can relate to this emotional state are sure to be influenced by at least one of Carroll’s 21 large-scale photos.

“The drapery pictures are about becoming the dwelling itself,” Carroll explains. “As a woman artist, I am addressing the benefits and liabilities of domesticity; the home as a place of comfort, or conversely, where decoration becomes an obsession to the point of the woman merging with her domestic interior and becomes invisible.”

The exhibit runs through March 12.

The IU Northwest Gallery for Contemporary Art is open to the public Monday through Thursday from 9 a.m. to 7 p.m., Friday from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m., and Saturday from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m.

The mission of the IU Northwest Gallery for Contemporary Art is to present an innovative exhibition program that complements and enhances the university’s academic offerings. Exhibit art collections are for study and research, and are also meant to educate the university community and general public about the forms and issues of contemporary and historic art from all cultures.

The gallery is located in the Savannah Center neighboring the IU Northwest Book Store.

For more information, contact Gallery Director Ann Fritz at (219) 980-6891 or e-mail afritz@iun.edu.