On November 17, 2011, I visited the Matthew Marks on West 24th St. and viewed Nan Goldin's Scopophilia exhibition. In the back room there was a 25 minute slide installation (commissioned last year by the Louvre Museum). There were over 400 photographs chosen from Goldin's career, that were paired her own autobiographical images with new photographs of paintings and sculptures from the Louvre's collection. Apparently, it was a very unique permission Goldin had to photograph paintings and sculptures from the Louvre - I wish I could take pictures of masterpieces in the Louvre and compare it next to my pictures of everyday life and have people see my work resemble a masterpiece.
In all seriousness, many photos were interesting, disturbing even. Begging a story where I fill in the gaps. That's fun, I love series of photos where I make a meaning to it. The waterfall pictures had beautiful action falling upon people of some gravity of a person. And the manner in which the were shot, the effects, were all very natural. Some candid looking, many posed, lots of breasts - breasts everywhere really - there just something I can't point out that bothers me, and it's not the lack of dicks in almost every Chelsea gallery.
Honestly, I'm not hating on Goldin, but it appears to me as having some friends pose for her fancy new camera that has high resolution and depth of field. In one room of the exhibition, it was a circular room, her photographs hung of these anonymous people - no one famous, just your average neighbor..and above them hung a photo of a saint or martyr from some old painting in the Louvre.
The repetition of the same models for many of the photographs gives it a movie feel - a character you grow to know. You don't know much about her but she's seen over and over again, as well as other characters. Their significance to the respective masterpiece is a study I'd have to make seeing each over and over again. Unless it was a random slideshow where her picture and the Louvre's pictures took turn with no implication, therefore rendering the whole installation a bluff.
I must add that in seeing it in person, there was this eerie gregorian chant music playing in the installation room, but it appeared to be a female voice - my memory fails me now. Maybe if it was a female chant, it's a clear statement, Women not having any rights in the church, but glorified in art? There was some narration over the chant, but too hard to understand through the echo of the room. Either way, the music made me uneasy, sad even - like a recount of the life of someone who has passed. Maybe the art's past, and the life of it today?
Goldin' artist statement: Desire awoken by images is the project's true starting point. It is about the idea of taking a picture of a sculpture or a painting in an attempt to bring it to life."
More specifically, The New Yorker reiterated her artist statement and the purpose or impact of these juxtapositions.
"Vince Aletti writes, Goldin 'photographed paintings by Delacroix, Corot, Zurbarán, and Bronzino, which fed that desire, then paired them with pictures of her friends and lovers, creating startling juxtapositions.' The result is 'a sensational paean, at once ecstatic and elegiac, to love, sex, and sensuality.' "
((Read more http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/photobooth/2011/11/nan-goldin-scopophilia.html#ixzz1edpS6TPE))
I'm sure this exhibition in many ways can be seen as sensational and marvelous in comparing her lovers and friends to the holiest of holy, with desire and sex as common as anyone's. There is just a sense I can't shake that the artist is wisely make herself known by leeching off the fame of masterpieces. And truthfully, that is the best way to make yourself known, a guarantee to find some sort of success somewhere. It is Goldin's 8th exhibition in the Marks Gallery, so it appears that maybe that wasn't the initial deal breaker to get a gig.
Overall, the exhibition called Scopophillia means "the love of looking." And in looking at all the photos, the only love I found, is in the congruency of the subjects, making it a familiar peek on the lives of these people.
I think the thing that bothers me is that at a gallery, we love to look at whatever is hanging up or on display. That is really why you walk in a gallery, to look at things. I feel the meaning of the title exploits a typical behavior that is expected from viewing her art. The change in language makes the title more interesting, more, "ooh, Scopophillia, sounds ancient, foreign, scientific - whatever could it be?" Meanwhile, if she named it, "The Love of Looking," people would be like, "well no shit, of course I love to look at things, or else I wouldn't be here."
I'm sure it can be argued that Toys R Us clearly sells Toys, but that's a company, a more permanent thing. This series of art, temporarily hanging, just evokes a pretentious vibe with a chant for attention to be advertised.
Goldin is smart but I'd give her show 3 stars.
Anyway, who am I? Just a kid looking at art and trying to be somebody.
