Linda Granfors: Amazing Annie Oakley

Annie Oakley (1860–1926) was a legendary American sharpshooter and performer. She toured with Buffalo Bill’s Wild West shows and became one of the first internationally renowned female performers. Her skills were admired and marveled at, while attention was also drawn to her small stature, feminine clothing, and her way of performing like a lady. Annie Oakley came from a poor background and was a self-taught sharpshooter who built her career in a male-dominated field during the Victorian era, when women were generally expected to remain at home.

Annie Oakley’s story contains many fascinating combinations of different elements, as well as contradictions and opposites. She represented traditional feminine values through her feminine appearance; her touring tent was neat and furnished in a homely manner, and she behaved as a woman was expected to behave, while at the same time working in a male-dominated profession and surrounded by men. She was also a more skilled shooter than most of her male colleagues. She encouraged women to acquire firearms and take part in sports, and suggested that female sharpshooters could be part of national defence, while she did not support the radical women’s rights movement.

During her lifetime, Annie Oakley was constantly featured in the media, and newspapers continued to publish stories about her even after her death. Different versions of her and her story were created through films, musicals, television series, and books, and through these representations she continued to live on as a mythical figure.

The works in the exhibition are inspired by Annie Oakley’s life story. Annie Oakley reportedly made her own performance costumes, and she had an extensive collection of firearms. I have created my own versions of her costumes, touring tent and its interior, as well as her collection of weapons and photographs published of her. I have used materials traditionally associated with women’s domestic work: recycled household textiles, reclaimed fabrics, dough, soap, porcelain objects, and ceramics, employing a variety of craft techniques in their creation.

Alongside the subject of the exhibition, the works explore public image, the creation of myths and fantasies, conformity, and the aesthetics associated with the home and with both men’s and women’s worlds—and how these are represented. Through the works, I also want to highlight different and conflicting values, and how they can appear in a different light as time and circumstances change. The works consider how traditional gender-based assumptions continue to influence our time. They also involve experimentation with materials and a playful approach to their possibilities.