Mallory Nanny reviews Ron English at Lazarides Gallery
06/07/2011
Ron English | Status Faction 2011
(oil polymer paint and collage on canvas)
(c) Ron English and Lazarides
'Post modernist Appropriation | Ron English: Skin Deep' at the Lazarides Gallery, London
Review by Mallory Nanny for Aesthetica Magazine Blog
In his first UK exhibition, entitled Skin Deep: Post-Instinctual Afterthoughts on Psychological Portraiture, contemporary artist, Ron English, bridges the gap between high and low art by incorporating mass produced, low brow imagery into traditional high art subjects. Portraits of historical icons like Marilyn Monroe, Ben Franklin and George Washington coexist with those of pop culture characters, Fred Flintstone and the Hulk in this exhibition. English builds each composition using vintage advertisements and cartoon imagery, some of which are found material that he enhances with paint, while others he illustrates in meticulous detail.
The artist reinvents the devotional image of the Madonna and Child by replacing the former with a human-cow hybrid. The seated female nude has the bodily attributes of a woman, but sports a feminized cow’s head. Her two breasts have lost each nipple, but have gained eight teats. The Madonna is posed cradling a peculiar, magenta-coloured version of the infant Christ who desperately tries to latch on to one of Madonna’s udders. The cow, a popular motif repeatedly used by the artist, is now elevated from farm animal to sacred status. While the supernatural green and blue shadows underscore her holy rank, the collaged backdrop of vintage comics and a 1950s brassiere advertisement brings this surrealist, yet high art totem down a notch. Some comic titles read Cowgirl, and Moon Girl, two strong female superheroes whom English may subtly relate to his hybridized Virgin Mary. While the viewer’s interpretation of this work may result in a rather ambiguous reading, the artist’s penchant for using comic illustration proves less satirical and more complex throughout the course of the exhibition.
Throughout his career, English has repeatedly appropriated Picasso’s Guernica (1937), a subject he regards as a contemporary model in art making. The painting that is currently installed at the Lazarides gallery contains skeletal portrayals of the original characters, each reproducing their long-standing gesture of war-torn trauma. Similar to his other work, English embeds other material into the background of this piece as well. A bar of photographic transfers depicting a bird’s eye view of a cityscape stretches across the... [read the full article on the Aesthetica Magazine Blog].
Image: "Status Faction", oil polymer paint and collage on canvas (2011) | Ron English | Courtesy the artist and Lazarides Gallery
Skin Deep: Post-Instinctual Afterthoughts on Psychological Portraiture continues at Lazarides Gallery, London until 23 July, 2011.
Mallory Nanny is a candidate for the MA in Art History at Richmond The American International University in London.
Aesthetica engages with contemporary art, contextualising it within the larger cultural framework. For further information, please visit the Aesthetica Magazine website.
Link to this page: http://www.richmond.ac.uk/n/1168.aspx
