After Ann and I stepped out of the Rosenwald Wolf gallery last week on a bright sunny day we spotted an unexplainable hovering object (uho) above what appeared to be the University of the Arts’ campus. The balloon was tethered to the ground and seemed to have a skirt on it. It looked a little like a jellyfish. Any info anybody?
Only this morning after a photo library clean out did I realize the uho’s unmistakable echoing of a work of art inside Rosenwald Wolf: Aaron Williams‘ painting of a hot body part in flat blue sky background. There’s something shocking about Williams’ paintings. Their overheated body references seem pop and high culture savvy (John Currin, Lisa Yuskavage and MTV) and yet I couldn’t get to the there in these works. Is it flesh/body/human that is all important in a flat, blank world? Is the Big Nothing infringing on the Big Humanoid? Body deformation sits heavy on this work, which could be a kind of human monolith a la “2001: A Space Oddysey.” Oh well, whatever it is, I guess it’s part of the anxiety-driven, post-millenial fascination with the grotesque, something we’ll be treated to for some time to come while we work our way to the future.
