Sunday, July 11, 2010

Bravo Appreciates Art Like It's 1984!


While I never expected Bravo's newest competition reality show, Work of Art, to be anything more than an Andy Cohen-approved showcase of lame pop culture references and unfounded smugness, I was brought to uproarious laughter last week when resident sorority girl-cum-artisté Jaclyn found herself swimming in a sea of praise from the hackneyed committee of NYC art wonk judges. In her absurdly cliched collection of photographs of anonymous men looking at her bronzed, tumid fun sacks as they walked past her on the street, the judges found an 'impressive' and 'successful' effort to subvert the so-called 'male gaze'--a chestnut of an idea about as interesting and revolutionary to artists and intellectuals as Myspace is to teenagers. Perhaps next week she will subvert capitalism by setting fire to dollar bills taped to an Audi? Viva la revolucion, Bravo.

(Please find below selections from my current fine art wishlist ~ in case you're wondering what it takes, creatively, to please an old crank like me.)

art1

art2


8 comments:

Unknown said...

The mountains are brilliant :-)

Moonangelnay on Etsy said...

wow i love the balloon and the mountains!

Karen/Small Earth Vintage said...

"bronzed, tumid fun sacks"--!!! Hee! I like your art picks.

Adriane said...

I love your art picks. And your commentary about Jaclyn reminded me of my favorite Michael Field poem.
http://davincithegenius.ning.com/profiles/blogs/guardians-poem-of-the-week-la

Only it's done well. And a long time ago. When it was actually new and interesting.

MAB from OtterCatHaus said...

Okay, I too have been watching and blogging about Work of Art. Jaclyn is about as original and fresh as Betamax. I kinda want to hit her. The only artistestant who manages to annoy me more is Miles and his faux overwhelmed by life schtick.
I have to go negate the male gaze now. Where is my tube top?

Melissa Righero said...

I've been wanting to see that show. I'm going to have to find it on the web some how.

Huzzah! Vintage said...

Oh, MAB, if I knew how to embroider, I'd stitch your comment onto a pillow. I still think that perhaps she's the show's Ur-art project: a woman who at once aggressively invites the male gaze and desperately tries to defuse it. Yawn.

Adriane ~ Many thanks for the link to the Field piece. I think I've seen this poem referenced in a few film studies-focused riffs on the gaze, but I'd never actually read it. You'd think that with more than a century's worth of thoughtful, critical engagement with the phenomenon, Jaclyn could come up with more than guerrilla snapshots of men (probably) checking out their own manscaped reflections in the window.

In the hands of a more intellectually adroit artist, the mise en abyme effect created by the funhouse mirrors could have been drafted in the service of a potentially interesting critique of contemporary regimes of looking, but that, I suppose, would have required more than a Gentleman's C in Art Theory 101.

alexkeller said...

i agree with your last comment - that funhouse mirror opens up so much more possibility. i haven't watched the show - can't decide if it's worth it. Jaclyn seems amusing.
(and i like the train depot - reminds me of Chicago)