Becoming-hysterical — becoming-animal — becoming-woman in The Horse Impressionists

Abstract

This text presents a reading of Lucy Gunning's video work The Horse Impressionists (1994),* in which five women are filmed whilst neighing like a horse. I will suggest that while this artwork comes dangerously close to reconfirming traditional Western beliefs that women are closer to the animal kingdom, and more prone to hysterical mimetic identification, it also raises questions about the extent to which contemporary art practices can stimulate and manifest ‘becoming’. By deconstructing traditional psychoanalytic accounts of subjectivity, I will explore the interface between two concepts of becoming; Luce Irigaray's and Deleuze/Guattari's in relation to The Horse Impressionists. I will propose that Gunning's video opens possibilities for art practices to work towards corporeal philosophies which pay attention to gendered embodied subjectivity. Philosophies such as these employ mimetic identification strategically and recognize that bodily ‘symptoms’ have validity in and for themselves and need not always be translated into sequential language frameworks.

Keywords:

• feminine
• becoming-animal
• embodiment
• Luce Irigaray
• Lucy Gunning
• Deleuze/Guattari