Annie
Reynolds
Painting
I
Molly
Zimmer
October
22, 2017
Tala Madani is an artist known primarily
for her paintings, although she works with many different types of media. She
was born in Tehran Iran, and went to school at Oregon State Univeristy as well
as Yale School of Art. Her paintings, done on linen with oil, often depict men
and sometimes children, in very vulnerable, grotesque, or uncomfortable
situations. Her subjects almost always seem to be bald, middle-aged men
engaging in absurd and inappropriate scenarios often with some type of violence
or perversity involved. They are loaded with associations and a complexity that
is very open to individual interpretation as well as many different possible
readings. Although Madani’s work is extremely dark, it is frequently so extreme that
I see it as bringing an almost comical tension between the stereotypical and
the iconic. I would not go so far as to say that I am a fan of her work,
however, I am very entertained by it and interested in looking at each of her
pieces so far.
One of her paintings that stands
out to me the most is the painting titled Up
and Down. The painting depicts her most frequent subject, the bald
middle-aged man, standing in his tighty whities and looking defeated as he
pathetically glances downward while tugging his underwear up. The combination
of the bold background with this miserable looking subject standing in the
middle of it evokes some kind of emotional and protective response from me. He
first appears to be standing confidently with his hands on his hips, but at
further inspection he looks sad and embarrassed and it makes me want to cover
him up and tell people not to laugh at him.
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Her pieces are extremely political! I love the idea of being able to do something you're passionate about and be able to make a difference with your art. And she makes some really great points with these pieces, like The Lesson, which I take as a commentary about the artist's opinion of what is being taught and forced on children in school, possibly even a lack of creativity and emphasis on work.
ReplyDeleteMadani sure likes to focus on bodily excretions. Urine, vomit, feces, and and ejaculate. We "piss" out information (The Lesson), engage in meaningless word vomit, that is, small-talk (Grey Shadows), and project our own "shit"/thoughts and feelings onto others' work (Rear Projection). All of these excretions of mind have little to no point other than we need to produce to survive among others. These tactics can turn a vagina into a volley of artistic interpretations when in the end, it's just a pussy (Abstract Pussy). Or, maybe the point was that she isn't trying to make a point. Regardless, her work made me think of the uncomfortable middle-aged generation. The older generation holds conservative views, the younger generation holds more progressive views and the middle generation is constantly conflicted between the two. Madani illustrates the lengths some must go through to survive the, sometimes, plight of politeness.
ReplyDeleteI don't like the topic but I understand her point. When you look at where the artist origins are from and then look back at her work I can see the political activism. Abstract pussy is probably the one I understand the most. I did a paper on the women's rights movement in the middle east, and her expression of the crowd boycotting the little girls private parts is probably the one that stands out the most to me.
ReplyDeleteI agree with your point of the painting bringing an almost comical tension between the stereotypical and the iconic. When I first looked at them I was shocked and with things that make us feel awkward we laugh and that's what I did so I could be able to inspect the paintings more. Once I got the idea of the political side I agree with the others and know this is a sure way of getting people's attention to see the sensitive subjects behind them. I also was the most intrigued by the Abstract Pussy, understanding the negative views of females in general to the public.
ReplyDelete