The life-changing power of being a fangirl
- Text by Miss Rosen
- Photography by Sue Webster
After 25 years together, British artists Tim Noble and Sue Webster split up. It wasn’t just the end of a marriage, but the end of an era – and Webster was charged with the task of rediscovering herself.
“I wanted to go back to that moment before I met him,” Webster says. “What kind of a person was I? I was really happy when I was a teenager. I was completely carefree and didn’t know what was going to happen in the future.”
After moving out of their home and studio, Webster decided to open three boxes she had been toting around since leaving her childhood home of Leicester, England, in the mid-’80s. That’s when she struck gold.
One box was filled with ephemera from Webster’s teen years; a treasure trove of records, concert ticket stubs, t-shirts, magazines, photographs, early artworks, and personal letters that shaped her aesthetics, philosophy, and sense of self.
“I wanted to investigate what made me into that person that went on and had that artistic career,” she says. “What were the key elements that made me take risks, think differently, take the opposite road of all my peers?”
“My theory is that I learned everything in life by listening to the first four albums of Siouxsie and the Banshees. I wanted to get out of my village and was searching for something to take me to a whole other world. I met people from different walks of life and got my passion to travel. We would meet up at a gig and go up and down the country. I became fearless.”
Determined to reconnect with the girl once was, Webster pinned some 250 objects from the box to the wall of her London studio. She traced her path with pieces of string, discovering the links between objects that guided her way. She titled this installation, “The Crime Scene”.
After it was completed, Webster decided to catalogue it in the new book, I Was a Teenage Banshee (Rizzoli). She describes the publication – which is an ode to fangirls, nostalgia and Siouxsie Sioux – as “a Pandora’s Box”.
Additionally, nestled deep within remnants of Siouxsie, David Bowie and Iggy Pop paraphernalia is a personal story Webster penned last year. Titled A Touch of Insanity, it details her time at Towers Hospital as an adolescent mental health inpatient.
“When I was writing the words, I needed to put that down but I could have buried it. I showed it to one person who said, ‘You need to expose this; it helps people understand why you are like you are, why you keep pushing yourself.’ It was quite a frightening thing to do, to reveal something about yourself.”
“In the partnership [with Tim] I felt that we hid behind each other. This is almost like the true work. The thing I had to hide has been totally revealed and that leaves you totally naked again. It was a moment of letting go of the past. Once you’ve done it, you move on.”
I Was a Teenage Banshee is out now on Rizzoli.
Follow Miss Rosen on Twitter.
Enjoyed this article? Like Huck on Facebook or follow us on Twitter.
Latest on Huck
The legendary trans artist & illustrator behind Drag magazine
A new book brings together pioneer Vicky West’s luminous illustrations of fantasy, femininity and fashion.
Written by: Miss Rosen
Why did police taser a Bristol grandfather in the face?
Trailblazing documentary I Am Judah chronicles community champion Ras Judah Adunbi’s horrific treatment at the hands of the police and his fight for justice.
Written by: Maisy Hunter
In photos: Ghana’s complex e-waste industry
A new exhibition explores the country’s huge, unregulated industry, which can be hazardous to workers’ health and the local enviroment, yet provides economic opportunity to many.
Written by: Isaac Muk
Meet Corbin Shaw, Huck 81’s Artist in Residence
The Sheffield born artist talks about the people and places that shaped his practice for the latest issue of Huck.
Written by: Josh Jones
The Blessed Madonna: “Dance music flourishes in times of difficulty”
The DJ talks about her debut album ‘Godspeed’, connection and resistance on the dance floor, the US election and more alongside exclusive pictures from her album release party.
Written by: Ben Smoke
Revisiting the birth of skate culture in 1970s Los Angeles
New photobook ‘Last Days of Summer: California Skateboarding Archive 1975–1978’ looks back at an iconic chapter of youth culture.
Written by: Miss Rosen