Jenny Irene Miller, “Legs (self-portrait)”, 2020
Jenny Irene Miller, “Legs (self-portrait)”, 2020
Using the photographic medium, I've directed my focus on myself. I've been thinking about queerness. What does it mean to be feminine? What does it mean to be masculine? What about a little bit of both? Who gets to decide?
“Legs (self-portrait)” is made in an intimate space that protects identifying features of who I am as a queer and Inupiaq person and provides minimal information to the viewer. “Legs (self-portrait)” withholds details about my gender identity, facial features, and other personal identifiers. This piece pokes fun at several pervasive standards of mainstream American culture, such as cleanliness and beauty, the gender binary, and arbitrary rules around who should and should not shave their legs.
Jenny Irene Miller (b. 1988, Sitŋasuaq [Nome], Alaska) currently lives in Albuquerque, New Mexico and will return to Anchorage, Alaska after finishing her MFA. Miller, Inupiaq, is an artist who primarily employs lens-based mediums, both photography and video. She is currently pursuing a MFA in Art Studio, with a concentration in Photography, at the University of New Mexico, where she also teaches an undergraduate course, “Introduction to Photography.” In 2019 she was selected as an Elizabeth Furber Fellow through the American Indian Graduate Center. She is currently a SITE Scholar via SITE Santa Fe. Miller holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Photomedia and a Bachelor of Arts in American Indian Studies from the University of Washington.
She has exhibited internationally. In 2021, her work will be part of a group exhibition at the Winnipeg Art Gallery in Canada. Miller is a recipient of awards from the Alaska Humanities Forum in 2016, National Geographic Society in 2013, Fulbright Canada in 2013, and Fulbright Canada Killam Fellowship to Canada in 2012. Her work has been published in Canadian Art, National Geographic, Forum Magazine, The New York Times Lens Blog, and more.
Pronouns: she/her, they/them.