English Version | What are you looking at?

The fascination for body parts that we often despise is what drives Sally Hewett to create truly empowering pieces. Her art shocks the most sensitive and inspires the freest, but above all, it raises a question: why do we continue to have such particular reactions when we encounter representations of the human body?

Josephine (2012), Lycra, foam padding, blouse, embroidery silk, hair, quilting hoop.
Josephine (2012), Lycra, foam padding, blouse, embroidery silk, hair, quilting hoop.

When Sally Hewett started her degree in Fine Arts, she wasn't sure what she really wanted to do. All she knew was that she saw herself more as a sculptor than a painter, and that she loved the human body. Her first piece depicting the human body came about by pure chance: one day, to distract herself from the hardships of college, she decided to embroider a daisy on a quilting hoop. While embroidering the center of the flower with pink thread, she suddenly saw a nipple emerge, and realized that the whole set made up a breast. It was at that very moment that she knew what she wanted to do from then on. Today, she fascinates and intrigues those who come across her pieces, leaving no one indifferent. Because it also had an impact on us, we talked with the artist so she could explain everything (or almost everything) about her creative process.

The contrasts present in your pieces are very interesting. You apply a perfect technique on "imperfect" bodies. What is the reasoning underlying your creative process?

Because my main interest is in those bodies usually considered less than perfect, I think it’s really important that my stitching and embroidery is as perfect as I can make it. I want to portray those bodies, which I love, in the most perfect and beautiful way I can. It wouldn’t work if my stitching was messy and badly done. Anyway, my Granny would have expected me to do it perfectly! I’m interested in how we see things and how we interpret what we see. Using something like embroidery, usually considered pretty and sweet, to portray something usually seen as ugly or even disgusting, perhaps means that the viewer can see both the embroidery and the subject matter a little differently. Similarly, with using iridescent beads for drops of sweat – does the prettiness of the beads mean that the viewer sees the sweatiness in a different light? Maybe it does for some people. I actually think that sweatiness isn’t always seen as ugly or disgusting these days – it’s almost seen as sexy for some people – especially gym enthusiasts.

When you create these pieces, what feelings do you want to arouse in the spectators? Do you try, in any way, to change the ideal of the "perfect" body?

I don’t think I actually aim to change people’s views on what the “perfect” body is – that would be some task! I’m not sure that I actually have an aim as such when I start making the pieces. I make them because I see someone, or someone sends me a photograph, or I see something online or on the TV that I’m fascinated or intrigued by. I want to make a piece about that body, I want to find out about it and make something that reflects my feelings about that body. I only know what it’s like to be in my body, and I want to imagine and try to understand what it’s like to be in this other body. The analysis and explanation really comes after I’ve made the piece. It’s only in retrospect that I have some understanding of what I was doing with any particular piece of work.

This issue of Vogue Portugal relates to innocence, and there is an interesting paradox between this theme and your art. The exposure of the body is related, precisely, with an absence of innocence. Embroidery is traditionally associated with delicacy and gracefulness, but you choose to create a stark contrast with the rawness of your art…

When we’re very young, we’re more or less totally innocent – we take everything to be just what it is. We’re visually innocent - a face is a face – babies don’t pass judgement on what they see. They don’t add extra meanings or connotations to things, they take them simply for what they are. Very young children don’t see things ‘as’ something, for example ‘as’ ugly or ‘as’ disgusting.  Seeing things ‘as’ something doesn’t happen until we’ve been swamped with social norms, and until we’ve learned to adapt our views to comply with those norms. It’s almost impossible to step outside whatever social constructions and norms we’re born into. So, although I don’t think for one minute that the things I make enable everyone who sees them to step outside the world of social norms and suddenly see the world differently, maybe they do enable some people to see some things slightly differently. Perhaps the mismatch between the medium and the subject matter leaves a little space for visual innocence. I hope so.

Is there any hidden fact about your art that you would like to share?

In every piece I make I use something, either fabric, thread, buttons, lace, beads etc., from the vast treasure-trove of things I inherited from my Granny. She was a very skilled needlewoman and upholsterer, and the person who first taught me to sew when I was very young.

Your art is empowering. Do you have any feedback from the public that has impacted you in a special way?

I have heard many positive things, such as: “Thank you. You’ve made me see my body in an entirely different way”, “thank you for representing my body”,  "thank you for making this condition a beautiful piece of art’" or "it is so refreshing as a male to feel that everything male is not ugly, aggressive and negative." But there are also negative opinions such as "pure, unadulterated filth!", "you should be ashamed of yourself." "She’s just doing it to get attention. Pathetic."

Translated from the original on "The Innocence Issue" of Vogue Portugal, published February 2023.Full stories and credits on the print issue.