From Alina Cohen’s article for Artsy:

In her body of work, Denny provides a strikingly contemporary take on witches, an age-old subject matter. She diverges from evil, supernatural, or campy depictions in favor of women photographed mostly in natural daylight, many in their street clothes. (Some subjects do, however, wear capes.)
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Following the 2013 National Galleries of Scotland exhibition ‘Witches and Wicked Bodies,’ which featured works from such major artists as William Blake, Francisco de Goya, Albrecht Dürer, and Eugène Delacroix, co-curator Deanna Petherbridge wrote: ‘The dangerous bitch and the hideous old witch are complementary representations, intended to show up women’s iniquities and punish them, but also to warn and frighten men.’

Denny’s series joins decades of rebellion against such portrayals, from Cindy Sherman’s vulnerable self-portrait (1986/1993) to the recent work of artists like Juliana Huxtable and Linda Stupart, both of whom link queerness to witchcraft in a liberated new way.

Read the entire article

View the exhibition “Major Arcana: Witches in America”
Browse all of Frances F. Denny’s work at ClampArt