Selling Venus, was created by Dominique Rey in a South Carolina striptease club. She photographed the erotic dancers in the intimacy of their dressing room at the very moment where, alone with themselves, they prepare for the game of seduction awaiting them on stage, when they turn themselves over to the gaze of the other.

These portraits seek to unveil, the artist stresses “the illusions and stereotypes while reactualizing the debate about women in oppressive roles.” Captured in the reflection of a glance, the pictures show women absorbed by their image, observing themselves, putting on makeup, and fixing their hair with scant attention to the presence of the photographer. In a play of glances and diverted attention, Rey suggests a representation of these women that is different from that of the simple reflection of male desire by emphasizing this more interior gaze, filled with hope and ambition.

Selling Venus, finds its origin in the artist's personal experience as a stripper in a club in Osaka, Japan. In this context, she took her first photographs revealing the ritual of physical and psychological transformation these workers practice every day, a ritual meant not only to prepare a game of charm and seduction, but also to adorn oneself in a protective suit.

Dominique Rey is a multidisciplinary artist based in Winnipeg, Canada whose practice includes photography, video, performance, collage, and sculpture. Her work delves into peripheral subjectivities, from individuals and groups of people on the margins of dominant culture, to performance-based works that mine the terrain of the unconscious. She is interested in examining the outsider within society, as well as a deep sense of being we have of being strangers to ourselves. For this reason, she utilizes modes of fragmentation to explore the construction of self, as it relates to current experiences of dislocation and disorientation.

For more information on Rey and her current work, visit her website.