The gall.
From the press release of an upcoming show at the Brooklynite Gallery titled “Go Get Your Shinebox”:
With the global economic downturn and the hardship it has caused blue-collar workers throughout, we find it fitting to explore the world’s simplest way to make a living- SHINING SHOES. We are planning an exhibition around just that— SHOESHINE BOXES.
And how will they “explore” it? By taking replicas of shoeshine boxes, decorating them, and plopping them in a gallery.
It gets worse.
However a “SHOESHINE BOX” should not be taken in the most literal sense of the words. These objects, our inspiration, have all been created out of necessity – a need to earn money, or further, to survive. We push “the need to survive” beyond its literal context, commissioning our favorite established and emerging artists to design their own, “SURVIVAL BOXES”.
This is a classic example of political art done wrong. Here’s the pattern:
1. Take an object associated with a subjugated group of people
2. Reproduce and decorate it
3. Assert a political critique
What’s so frustrating about work like this is that it simply aestheticizes a political symbol without getting to the bottom of the core issues that political symbol represents. A pure visual product alone is silent and – because it’s a work of art – open to multiple interpretations. This is the opposite of assertion. It’s suggestion. And suggestion and open-endedness is what makes art great. But when an artist traffics in political subjects that have real-world affect on subordinated peoples’ lives, simple open-ended “visual inquiry” by priveleged artists producing for a priveleged audience is an offense. It exploits serious social problems for cultural capital gains.
This Shinebox project is even worse because it ignores the issues behind shoeshiners and focuses on the damn box. And then, in an extraordinarily outrageous move, leaves the box behind and sets up a show of “survival boxes” drawing attention to the individual ARTISTS leaving behind the source subjects.
If you want to, you can visit their atrociously designed website and then navigate to the exhibition page. Only to find it broken. Let’s hope it stays that way.
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