Does "artwork on the body" mean "body-oriented artwork"?
Context:
Feminist-inspired art practices in the 1990s that referenced the body were especially susceptible to this mistaken assumption. We saw earlier how Julia Kristeva’s theories of the semiotic and abjection were crucial in asserting a pre-Oedipal psychic imaginary that was instrumental for considering women’s art practices in particular, but the prefix ‘pre’ tended to associate these spaces with regressive psychosis in relation to symbolic norms and consistency. In fact, Kristeva goes so far as to call works of art ‘experimental psychoses or experimental autism’, although she sees these acts as profitable in giving voice to states of morbidity. Wanting to situate these kinds of psychic spaces in a slightly different light, art historian Mignon Nixon looked at Louise Bourgeois’s artwork through the lens of psychoanalyst Melanie Klein’s theories. Her essay ‘Bad Enough Mother’, 1995, was notable in situating an alternative conceptual framework for artwork on the body, one that diverges from and perhaps even forms ‘a critique of psychoanalytic feminist work of the 1970s and ‘80s’ which privileged signifiers of ‘pleasure and desire over hatred and aggression’.
The context is ambiguous. Standing alone, "artwork on the body" would seem to mean tattoos, and "artwork about the body", which would be "body-oriented artwork", would be clearer. However, just as you can have a book "about trees" or a book "on trees", similarly "artwork on the body" could be used to mean "artwork about the body"
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The context is ambiguous. Standing alone, "artwork on the body" would seem to mean tattoos, and "artwork about the body", which would be "body-oriented artwork", would be clearer.
However, just as you can have a book "about trees" or a book "on trees", similarly "artwork on the body" could be used to mean "artwork about the body"