The People's Art
Russian artists Vitaly Komar and Alex Melamid polled Americans to find out exactly what we're looking for in a painting, and, apparently what we want is a dishwasher size landscape featuring a famous historical figure. Check out the resulting paintings from the United States and several other countries.
Komar and Melamid's snarky project is already ten years old, but I just discovered it this morning as a quick aside in Amy Hempel's novella Tumble Home. A poet friend recommended Hempel to me, saying, "Every one of her sentences makes me fall on the floor and weep." When I had finished laughing haughtily over what a great workout that must be, I tore out onto the street and made a flying leap for Barnes and Noble.
2 comments:
I would have to say that in terms of content and theme, "Kenya's Most Wanted" is my favorite. There's just something about seeing the risen Christ decending from Mount Kilimanjaro to greet the woman and boy tending their diminuative hippo herd while the itinerant grape-stomper carries on with his work, apparently not noticing or not caring about the Presence behind him that brings a smile to my face every time.
Ha! It's kind of the psychedelic version of that Auden poem about Icarus falling from the sky and the world carrying on as usual.
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