Serrah Russell

The First Ladies Club: or How to Get a Woman in the Oval Office

In 2016 when I filled in the bubble next to Hillary Clinton’s name on the ballot, I thought to myself, “I just voted for the first Madam President.” I am still aghast as to why, despite celebrating the centennial of (some) women having the right to vote, a woman still has not broken through that highest of glass ceilings and served in the most powerful position of the United States, as leader of our country. I am grateful for the right to vote, though grateful isn’t quite the right word. A woman’s right to vote is not a gift, but stolen goods returned.

These digital collages are from my series “The First Ladies Club: or How to Get a Woman in the Oval Office,” using photographs from the Vogue Magazine archive of past and present First Ladies of the United States. The titles are quotes from articles featuring these women, before, during, and after their role as First Lady. The work uses the experience and representation of a First Lady to reflect on the position and perception of women in the United States. Where is her power? How does public perception adorn, admire, idealize, and imitate her? She is bound by the pages of fashion magazines, judged for her aesthetics, style, and constructs of grace, just as she is bound to the traditions and expectations for American women.What do we see when we gaze at these faces, dissolving into the background? Are they wallpaper? Decor? Fixture? Mirage? What becomes of their likeness when they enter the Oval Office? We watch a curtain catch on fire as three seamstresses fit a woman for her wedding dress. We see a woman as a silhouette; her face becomes the wallpaper behind her. We witness a woman’s face breaking, collapsing and continuing to dissolve. When a woman's dress appears to melt like frosting into the background, we behold as her white-gloved hand steadies her. Always women, the First Ladies are explicitly feminine always, yet never sexual. These women are not seen through their own experiences. They are first and foremost viewed through the lens of their husband’s. His job creates her position. His choices are now her responsibility. His opinions are now hers as well. Or risk being the woman who does not standby her man. She must always remember that the First Lady is not elected. She comes to her position by marriage, not votes. This is a blessing and a curse, a power and a trap. His presidency seals her fate. Like all women, First Ladies are complex. They have their own opinions. We can and should allow ourselves to hate them, love them, respect them, ignore them, but it is perhaps the erasing that is the most painful.