The Southern Belle

By: Dexter Jacobs
“Target: Fan” painted in 1998, by Steven Wise.
The image is of a green abstracted fan shape hung on a stage. A word, ‘tender,’ is written on the fan. It appears to have been taped upon a stage with an encircling black oval around the boarder of the canvas. This painting is representative of a series of “stage” paintings Wise painted around ten years ago. Wise collected church fans and this is where he got the inspiration for these paintings.
The images in these paintings by Wise were chosen to symbolize the American South. He says he chose to paint these fans upon a stage to symbolize “the artificiality of the illusion of painting and the artificial world of the Southern belle.” He created an illusion of a stage to symbolize the illusion of these icons from the past, which we attribute to the better parts of the south.
Wise was fascinated with the image of the Southern belle. These real people of the past serve as an icon of the contemporary “and live in the present day through images from movies such as Gone with the Wind.” as defined by wikipedia; A Southern Belle epitomized southern hospitality, cultivation of beauty and a flirtatious yet chaste demeanor. These women of the past have created a fine picture of the south and it is clear why Wise would want to immortalize the idea of these qualities in his paintings.
The fan itself, the very symbol of these women, “were common in the South where there was no air conditioning.” The general shape of the one in ‘Target: Fan’ is similar to that of the generic hand fan given for free at the Iowa State Fair. In this painting the fan is actually a piece of mylar which Wise cut and affixed to the canvas. “At the time, I was playing with the illusion of real and implied textures.” This goes back to the illusion Wise pointed out by placing the fan upon the stage in the beginning. He chose to place the word ‘tender’ on the fan to refer to the general use of the word as well as to reference the song by Elvis, Love me Tender.
Personally, I was drawn to this piece by its quiet mystery. I found the fan object to be quite beautiful, simply by its shape and luminescence. It caused me to wonder why this shape should imply tenderness? Why were these colors chosen to portray this feeling? I wanted to know these answers yet at the same time I was able to appreciate the simple beauty that all of these elements were chosen to merely be together on the same canvas. Now that I know why Wise painted these things it makes me want to further discover why he was so interested in these women of the past. Was it the mystery of the past created into an icon of today? Or, was it their beauty? Either way the painting itself has become a ‘belle’ of its own.