The Artist Dana Schutz Exhibition Overview: A Feast of Gloop from the Painter Who Outraged New York
Dana Schutz cakes her paintings in thick gobs of viscous pigment. This first proper London exhibition is a splodgy, orgiastic tribute of her medium, but significant themes are smuggled through if you manage to uncover them.
The Artist's Technique
Schutz’s approach – earning her acclaim as a leading painters of her generation – is focused on texture, application, colour and materiality. This is art for artists, real high-level aesthetic geekery. If you get your kicks immersing yourself in coats of color and shadow, there’s enough here to keep you going for a long time. But it’s her bizarre, surreal, cartoony, metaphorical imagery that really makes the artworks resonate.
Works in the First Gallery
The works in the initial room are populated by enormous one-eyed beings and baying crowds. One piece shows a group of figures stomps senselessly towards something outside the frame, waving hands and creating a path of trash in their path. A different work features a person receiving a large disguise in an odd ceremony before a crowd of unattractive followers. It’s not hard to read any of this as political, as commentary on America’s condition, on how society is divided and angry, and mob mentality is transforming all to rubbish.
An Embrace by the artist.
Shift in Focus
In the second exhibition area, Schutz seems to shift her focus to the leaders and elites, instead of the crowds that follow them. Mysterious forms fill their faces with fruit and meat in a sombre dining room; a cardinal and a green-clad man sit back in gilded seats – whereas in other works a couple console each other in a landscape filled with dead bodies, and a female figure, perhaps the artist, rests unclothed, desolate and helpless in a bed.
Inspirations and References
This is extremely complex, multi-layered art, filled with references. There’s the dreamy surreal symbolism of a symbolist master, the fleshy pink cartoonishness of Philip Guston, the festive bizarre elements of a Belgian artist, the large-headed oddities of a contemporary artist. There are riffs on the art historical tradition, countless nods to mainstream media (I am almost 100% sure that a particular work is a depiction of Handsome Squidward from an animated series). It would take time identifying all the elements from classic painters with which she’s sprinkled the artworks.
A Model by the exhibitor.
Meaning and Stories
Art this complex, complex and allegorical leaves itself open to interpretation. It seems like I’m being quizzed on the symbolism of a Renaissance masterpiece but, for my money, there are a couple of distinct narratives: the ruling class, and the crowds that they provoke.
Controversy and Impact
And Schutz should know about such dynamics. In 2017, her artwork a titled piece – a semi-abstracted depiction of the body of a historical figure, a young African-American who was lynched by two white men in Mississippi in 1955 – caused untold controversy when it was shown at the a New York exhibition. She was accused of profiting from tragedy for her own gain. A protester picketed the work daily, and some called for it to be removed. A white artist depicting – arguably with great sympathy – a scene of black pain was the major headline of the event. It was the peak of the recent culture wars, a time that saw people turning on each other even if they were on the identical team. In retrospect, in a world increasingly polarized, simplified and more hostile than ever, it feels almost quaint that people had the time to get angry at this emotional, mournful painting.
Legacy and Current Work
It could have ruined her career, and Schutz probably wants to move on. But everything she’s done since exists in its influence. She unavoidably came out of that experience a transformed creator. But what hasn’t changed is how good she is, how she continues to practice in masterful, unsettling, thick and highly topical painting at the top tier.
