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February 03, 2010

An Entry in the Museum of Bad Art's Iterpretator Challenge

The Museum of Bad Art in Massachusetts is a little-known treasure of American culture. It challenges notions of good and bad in art, and makes the viewer stop and think, seriously, about what makes a work of art interesting, challenging, or plain ridiculous.

It recently closed the submission period for its seventh "Guest Interpretator Challenge." In this, members of the art-astute public were invited to submit a title and an intepretation for a new acquisition of MOBA. Always being up for a challenge, I looked at this vibrant canvas from every possible angle. After consulting many serious tomes on philosophy, artistic technique and cross-cultural ramifications, I created this submission, of which I am justifiably proud:

Worlds in Collision: When Karl Met Carrot Top

Pointless psychosexual and meteorological tensions permeate this tour de force, depicting an imagined meeting of European fashion designer Karl Lagerfeld and American comedian Carrot Top as a youth. The negative space between the two captures the historic conflict between Europe and America. Sartorially sinister Lagerfeld, embodying the Old World’s dark perspective and penchant for donning sunglasses at night, leers at virginal Carrot Top, the naïve but spunkily practical symbol of America. By placing Lagerfeld on an inexplicable red platform, the confused artist adds either an ominous neo-fascist tonality or suggests that Lagerfeld is a space alien standing on the transporter that beamed him down from the mothership. Behind Lagerfeld, the calm sea, sunset and twinkling stars connote either a peaceful summer evening or a stormy, tragic meditation on the fin de siècle hopelessness of Lagerfeld’s fashion and art weltanschauung. In either case, the painting’s je ne sais quoi remains elusive.

Van | 02/03/10 at 06:29 AM | 2 Comments | 0 TrackBacks | Categories: Sensual pleasures