May 30, 2002
Disrobing the Family
The Aldrich reveals the familiar and fascinating in blood relationships.
By Brita Brundage
The Aldrich Museum of Contemporary Art takes a gamble in its latest
exhibition Family, attempting to encompass every nuance of this broad,
indefinable topic through the works of 37 living artists. Ultimately,
the collection succeeds, not because it is cohesive, but because individual
works are so thought provoking and stand-alone that they more than account
for Family's blander shortcomings. Specializing, as it does, in contemporary
forms of expression, video installations form a significant portion of
many Aldrich shows, Family notwithstanding. Sometimes, videos become a
highly charged medium and a comment themselves on our screen-focused culture,
but too often they feel like imagination cut short.
Doug Hall's top of the stairs 1983 video, "These Are the Rules,"
becomes nearly maddening as one progresses through the exhibition. Heard
long before it is seen, the artists' shrill voice echoes through the gallery:
"Try not to be a racist! Obey the laws! Stay on the straight and
narrow! Follow the rules!" ad nauseum. The video is meant to illustrate
the overwhelming force of patriarchal authority in human relationships,
the crippling effect of parental admonishments, but really seems to be
Hall's own pathetic therapy session, more annoying than enlightening.
Likewise, Mark Wallinger's 1994 video installation Royal Ascot, one of
the exhibits' highlights presumably because it is part of the collection
of the British Council, misses its mark. Four TV screens show images of
the Queen Mother and her entourage riding circles in carriages, on different
days, as evident only by the different colored hats. Meant to show the
world's fascination with the royal family, it, instead, highlights the
boredom and plastic repetition of their lives.
Laura Dunn's 1999 video "Baby," projected on an upstairs screen,
is the first glimpse into the possibility of video as a storytelling and
artistic device. In it, the artist discusses the urge to have a child,
against all social concerns, as the screen shows black and white images
of a toddler wandering outside. Twenty-seven babies are born every 10
seconds, she says in the video, and, on-screen, every ten seconds, another
number is shown, 27, 54, 81, etc. Her boyfriend argues against her maternal
instincts, separating sex from bearing children, but nothing, not even
logic, quells her compulsion. The video is successful in both its simplicity
and honesty, balancing population overload with the natural instinct for
mothering.
The notion of family in art, however distorted, works best when it displays
an intimate and personal piece of the artist, which, in turn, speaks directly
to the viewer. For this reason, Alan Berliner's 60 minute 1996 film, "Nobody's
Business," is well worth the time investment. Shown in a separate
room with wooden benches for viewing, the film combines 8mm home movie
footage with interviews Berliner shot with his sister, his Jewish father,
Oscar, and his Egyptian mother, Regina. In watching, viewers learn much
about the artists' need to understand himself through his relationship
with his father. He guides his reluctant father to open up about his emotions.
"Did you love her?" he asks Oscar, as the film shows images
of the young, beautiful Regina, leaning over the edge of a boat, waving
from the beach.
"Who knows?" the father replied, "that's just what you
did in those days."
Now, years after the divorce, the mother has returned to her first love--performing--while
the ailing father has retreated into solitude, talking to the doorman
to avoid complete loneliness, a sad reflection of the former confident
businessman of the home movies.
In delving into the darkest personal regions, like cutting out a malignant
tumor to tack it on the wall, artists like Berliner have accomplished
the greatest professional act: holding themselves up for painful inspection
with no considerations to shame or humiliation. Sophie Calle reaches these
heights in her piece, "Autobiographies (The Rival)," done in
1992. Looking at the nearly 6-foot enlarged love letter which Calle's
husband had written to his mistress, one feels like a voyeur into the
artist's bedroom. The sign above reads in part: "I wanted a love
letter but he would not write one to me . . . This became the letter I
had never received."
What hurts, especially, in studying the letter, is the poetic beauty of
her husband's language. It is not a sexually charged manifesto, as one
might expect, but a sweet, loving sonnet to what seems to be his true
beloved. "You are a dream that sat down next to me," he writes.
"I'm a row of empty seats filled with strangers." Calle has
made corrections over the typewritten print, nonsensical changes that
highlight her frustration and helplessness.
Robert Melee's 2001 photo collection, housed behind sickly yellow plastic,
called "Mommy & Me," is as far from a traditional notion
of parent-child relationship as one could imagine. His mother is dressed
provocatively in the shots, like an aging stripper, breasts sagging, garter
belt folding beneath loose flesh. She wears wigs, her face loaded with
clownish makeup, she holds a can of beer and seems to be always cavorting
wildly in a bizarre never-ending party while her son, the artist, poses
with her affectionately. He seems conditioned to his mother's naked body,
sits beside her while she's in the bathtub, cradles her, and through her
thick red lips and ghostly painted face, she appears to love him, theatrically
and madly.
It would seem that no piece could be as personal as Chrissy Conant's "Chrissy
Caviar," 2000-02. After all, she has literally put her own harvested
eggs on display in separate caviar jars, complete with cutesy labels and
housed in a refrigerated case. While interesting enough to make News of
the Weird, and certainly a commentary on the artists' turning forty and
waiting to secure a mate, the work feels gimmicky. The whole business
(complete with an informative website www.chrissycaviar.com) is so sterilized
and absent of feeling, that there simply isn't much to look at.
Sean Mellyn's 2000 work, "It's a Beautiful Day," on the other
hand, is a perfect place to land after meandering through the Family exhibit.
Like an adrenaline shot after the often subdued colors of the surrounding
works, this is wildly bold, a painting of a young girl laughing that literally
explodes down the wall and onto the gallery floor in three-dimensional
pieces. Shapes turned to creatures climb a ladder out of her head; a milk
carton with legs, strange Dr. Seuss-like beings are all in Crayola-bright
purple, yellow and red. It is a sure commentary of the limitless possibilities
of the unformed child's mind and the boundlessness of imagination unbridled.
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The Aldrich Museum of Contemporary Art is located at 258 Main St., Ridgefield.
Family will run through Sept. 4. Hours: Tues.-Sun., noon-5pm. Admission
is $5, $2/students and seniors, free/under 12. Museum is free to the public
every Tues. Call 438-4519 or visit www.aldrichart.org for more information.