We get schooled on manners from Miss Meatface, the housewife dominatrix tackling gender stereotypes
Miss Meatface is just another 60s housewife – that is, except, you’re more likely to see her donning BDSM latex while baking a cherry pie. The part dominatrix, part Stepford brainchild of California-based artist Kat Toronto fuses vintage kitsch with overt kink to tackle gender stereotypes and rewrite perceptions of what it means to be subservient and feminine. With her latest project, a classic manners book called Miss Meatface: On Etiquette & Entertaining, Toronto outlines her rules for beauty, beating the patriarchy and being the perfect woman. Here, she shares her tips.
“I just wanted people to think, ‘Is she having this dinner party because she’s the perfect hostess? Or is it because she’s going to lead them one-by-one into the dungeon and domme them?’” – Kat Toronto
ALWAYS BE THE PERFECT HOSTESS (BUT DO IT IN HEAD-TO-TOE LATEX)
“Early last fall, my now-husband and I had just started planning our wedding, and it was like, ‘Oh my gosh – there’s nothing like planning a wedding to make you realise how crazy gender stereotypes are.’ I started really looking at those roles and thinking about what it means to be a wife and husband. Through that, I found all of these old etiquette books, like How To Be A Perfect Hostess.
At the same time, I started going through and archiving a lot of my grandmother’s photographs and letters, looking through her china. In doing so, I really got pulled in this whole other life that people had back in the 40s, 50s, and 60s. Part of me felt like, ‘God, I really missed out on this!’ But the other part of me felt like, ‘Whoa, this is such a confining view of what womanhood is supposed to be.’ And it wasn’t even that long ago!
That led me to start writing my own Miss Meatface rules about entertaining and beauty. It was partly playful, but it was also about the shock of seeing this really typical 50s or 60s housewife, offering up really useful but also kind of oppressive pieces of advice while wearing head-to-toe latex. I just wanted people to think, ‘Is she having this dinner party because she’s the perfect hostess? Or is it because she’s going to lead them one-by-one into the dungeon and domme them?’”
BE COOL, CALM & COLLECTED
“Being cool, calm and collected is one of Miss Meatface’s most important pieces of advice – always being calm in the face of challenging situations. But there are also a few rules in Chapter 3, which is the Advice for the Modern Woman section that really gets me like, ‘A true lady of refinement and class can hold court anywhere she pleases and look elegant doing so,’ or ‘Don’t waste your time comparing yourself to others, as it does absolutely nothing for your self-esteem or complexion.’ But my absolute favorite quote has to be: ‘Delicate flowers must know how to crack a fierce whip.’ That’s important, especially as women. You may look like the loveliest little flower, but down below, you have to be a hellion.”
BEING NICE GOES A LONG WAY
“I’ve been thinking a lot about why etiquette is important in the 21st century, especially because a lot of people think of it as an antiquated thing we just don’t have to bother with anymore. But it’s really important and has a lot to do with respect and respecting everyone around you.
There’s just something to be said about having manners. If you look at Trump, he could definitely benefit from having some. Etiquette never goes out of style – manners are absolutely timeless. But all of that has been lost in our society. People are intent on staring at their phones in their little bubbles, and they forget that there are other people around them, but it’s nice to be nice to people.”
FIND YOUR INNER MEATFACE
“I originally started Miss Meatface in 2014, during a really difficult time in my life, and she kind of turned into my personal art therapy. I started taking portraits of myself displaying on the outside what I was feeling on the inside. I was horribly, horribly depressed and emotionally bruised and battered, so I would put black eyes on myself and take self-portraits with polaroids just trying to have fun while at the same time, trying to express how fucking horrible I felt.
“There’s just something to be said about having manners. If you look at Trump, he could definitely benefit from having some” – Miss Meatface
Playing Miss Meatface and executing these violent fantasies of what I was wanting to do to myself in a safe way that wouldn’t actually harm me, really got me through that trauma. It was a really personal thing at the time, but she just seemed to grow and evolve into her own character that I fell in love with, and that people seemed to really enjoy on Instagram. I don’t know how, but she just became this larger than life personality that got me through a really dark period. It might sound cheesy, but if it weren’t for her, I feel like I might be dead right now.”
JUST SAY NO TO INSTAGRAM TROLLS
“People always ask me, ‘Don’t you get worried when you post your work that people are going to say something that’ll really upset you?’ I’m just not one of those people that cares. If someone writes something horrible and derrogatory on my photo, I have no problem deleting it. But most of the time, I don’t even notice. I’ve met so many women that inspire me through Instagram, why would I care about the ones that talk shit?”
JUST DO IT
“With Trump in office and all of the horrible things coming out about Hollywood right now, people are no longer able to ignore the misogyny in our culture. It’s utterly frightening that someone like him could be put in a place of power. I think that alone has opened up a lot of people’s eyes. We have a lot to fight for and we have to get this shit out of our systems – why should we have to play nice when he can’t even keep his hands to himself? That’s why I tell myself to keep making art. Don’t think about it. Don’t sit down and over-analyse things. Just do it, regardless of how stupid or boring you think it is.
Art is exactly what we need right now to start conversations. It’s our job as artists to put stuff out there that people may not think about or encounter in their everyday lives. That alone could change the way people interact with the world. And if I can do that through my images – that’s a huge bonus.”
