The work of a Dutch artist with a distinctive style-including “pornokitsch”-will receive its Midwest debut when the Arts Club of Chicago presents “Marlene Dumas: Works on Paper and Paintings” Wednesday through March 5.
Dumas, who has lived in Amsterdam since 1976, was born in Capetown in 1953. Her work reflects her experiences of growing up white in South Africa.
According to the intriguing press release, “the artist invests a classical repertoire of human figures, nudes and portraits with ambiguity. Little girls appear to be symbols of vulnerability-or symbols of sly power. Images of fat-bellied, clenched-fisted babies appear to be innocents-or furies-born of the artist’s maternal or malignant emotions.
“Fairy tales, recurring subjects of works such as `Snow White and the Broken Arm’ and `Snow White in the Wrong Story,’ are transformed by Dumas into chilling, psychological thrillers.”
“My art is presently situated between the pornographic tendency to reveal everything, and the erotic tendency to keep what it’s all about secret,” the artist has explained. As for the fairy tales in her work: they’re “pornokitsch: a sugary way to clothe impure motives.
“Negativity and anxiety (are) disguised with childlike humor, while the political-sexual attitudes bleed through at the edges.”
The exhibition at the club, 109 E. Ontario, is open to the public free of charge; the hours are 10:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. Monday through Friday, and 10:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Saturday.
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