Eating Disorder
Wednesday, August 08, 2007
Another fine review sent to me by Lizza:
Something is out of order at the new all-women Graca Machel Residence at UCT. Personally I can only explain it as an evil patriarchal conspiracy to destroy the natural appetites of young female university students, and drive them into abject self-abasement and ultimate suicide. They have Debora Poynton paintings in the dining room.
While any of her work can put you off eating, this huge diptych, which dominates the space as thoroughly as posters of Big Brother in 1984, is carefully directed at destroying a broader range of appetites. A common, even humble, aspiration of most undergraduate students is that university life will involve going to a few parties. Daily experience of these pictures will change all that. The paintings depict a party scene, in a hideous, clinically-lit frieze frame of the kind
which one's memory reserves for life's most excruciating experiences. There's a gallingly boring woman who looks like she's from Rondebosch East rubbing her ugly bra for no apparent reason, as the party is to say the least not sexy. The most dominating figure is a man with his mouth thrown wide open in the rictus of a silent scream, Poyntian tonsils on show, who appears to be none other than the artist's ex-husband. Small wonder. And the usually affable and humane Ralph Borland snarls out of the painting as if he had contracted rabies, his eyes
rolling up into his skull.
More insidious, to me, is that this work is on university property, placed in a position calculated to affect the impressionable young womens' appreciation of culture. My suspicion is that the true aim of these paintings is to destroy for ever the students' appetite for art.
Something is out of order at the new all-women Graca Machel Residence at UCT. Personally I can only explain it as an evil patriarchal conspiracy to destroy the natural appetites of young female university students, and drive them into abject self-abasement and ultimate suicide. They have Debora Poynton paintings in the dining room.
While any of her work can put you off eating, this huge diptych, which dominates the space as thoroughly as posters of Big Brother in 1984, is carefully directed at destroying a broader range of appetites. A common, even humble, aspiration of most undergraduate students is that university life will involve going to a few parties. Daily experience of these pictures will change all that. The paintings depict a party scene, in a hideous, clinically-lit frieze frame of the kind
which one's memory reserves for life's most excruciating experiences. There's a gallingly boring woman who looks like she's from Rondebosch East rubbing her ugly bra for no apparent reason, as the party is to say the least not sexy. The most dominating figure is a man with his mouth thrown wide open in the rictus of a silent scream, Poyntian tonsils on show, who appears to be none other than the artist's ex-husband. Small wonder. And the usually affable and humane Ralph Borland snarls out of the painting as if he had contracted rabies, his eyes
rolling up into his skull.
More insidious, to me, is that this work is on university property, placed in a position calculated to affect the impressionable young womens' appreciation of culture. My suspicion is that the true aim of these paintings is to destroy for ever the students' appetite for art.
Labels: Lizza
posted by Robert Sloon at 9:08 AM
15 Comments:
geez lizzi, i was just banging on about this a moment ago to a friend! bring on the bulimia.
very odd indeed.
bring on the food fight! first one to coat the monstrous thing in something yummy and preferrably opaque is my new - and forever - hero!
Um.....what exactly is this a review of?
well said. WHAT THE FUCK?
Dear Jeremy the Slightly Sexy and Anon,
last night I went to see the show called Easy Access that was in the dining hall at the new Graca Machel residence. But the show was dwarfed by these paintings, and by the time I came out of there I was overcome by a need to say what I felt about them.
You should see them yourself, really. Or just google debora poynton. You'll see.
In that case I would contest Robby Sloon's description of this as a "fine review" if there is no mention of a single work in the exhibition (let alone the title). I think your review is proportionately equitable to the yuckiness of Poynton's "work".
A Lizzian Review of 3C at the AVA
By Jeremy The Slightly Sexy
Something is wrong with the AVA. As I was walking outside it a bird crapped on my head. This public display of avian fecal flinging put me off my dinner. It was a very unaesthetic hue of green. I had to wash my hair three times to get it out.
I think it is insidious that this happened to me near these hallowed halls of art display. I think it is part of an AVA scheme to sell more Pantene.
Jeremy you are slightly sexy AND slightly funny. Thankyou, I enjoyed that comment.
i live there and my appetite has not suffered. though i see you point. as i saw it before (it is slightly obvious).
maybe it will stop commerce girls from getting shitfaced and making themselves look stupid.
dum di dum doo.
you live at the AVA?
lol
It's is a poignant disappointment to find such appalling reviews being classified as fine. What constitutes as fine when nothing in the review even slightly hints at the EASY ACCESS review. Apart from the reviewer having the attention span of bulimic kid, I mean how ekse can you explain this lapse in concentration from a main exhibition to a lousy "party artwork" featuring a few whiteys? WTF? get your review skills intact. & Mr Sloon stop giving credit where it isn't due, instead advise this sloppy review for some attention classes and a bit of English writing skills before she embarrasses herself any further!
Sorry Connoisseur, but what EASY ACCESS review where you referring to? There hasn't been one. I was thinking of writing one, as supporting student initiatives is, I feel, a positive thing. However, I found the show a little bit incoherent, and the work a tad on the studenty side of things. So although some works stood out, the show on a whole didn't hold my interest. Nevertheless, if you feel otherwise, ArtHeat is open to submissions, my email address is in the sidebar, and you are welcome to write one and send it to me. Show how good your English is.
I meant to say EASY ACCESS exhibition not review. I mean how can you explain someone going to review a dining hall. I mean how crass can you get. I bet this imbecile will have a rough time and life-load of reviews if he/she (what is Lizza anyway?) visited other UCT buildings as they too are littered with these artworks. Surely, the purpose of the reviewer having set foot in Graca's dining hall would have been to view the exhibition that was in progress, but then as I said - the lack of an attention span - led to her musing over irrelevant works. If anything those diners see nothing special in that artwork (they see paint and people) how it would deter them is beyond me. Unless a practising art-bulimic were residing at Grace; than that would be agood excuse.
On a more positive note -- you start well, in your response, Mr Sloon. Now continue (without asskissing Lizza). On the EASY ACCESS exhibition, you were saying...? (My writing does not permit me to write on arty farty stuff - I'll leave that to the bored art lot ;-)
connoisseur is secretly deborah poynton...."what is lizza anyway" LMAO
Dear Connoisseur and others,
Thankyou so much for showing me the error of my ways. I don't know what got into me, thinking as I did that art might hung in a dining room, and not only in galleries. I should have guessed, because I keep my books in my dining room, and it has become obvious to me that this means they are no longer literature. I realised that Joseph Conrad is a Hungarian pastry chef.
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