An art exhibit in San Antonio by Joshua Bienko, assistant professor of visualization at Texas A&M, has “generated substantial buzz,” says the San Antonio Current, an Alamo City news and culture publication.
The Current heralded Bienko’s show, on display through May 1 at Artpace, a nonprofit contemporary visual arts center, as a “Critic’s Pick” on its website.
“Bienko painted convincing versions of Jeff Koons’ ‘Rabbit’ and Andy Warhol’s ‘Campbell’s Soup Can’ on the soles of Christian Louboutin stilettos,” reads the Current’s “critic’s pick” entry. “Taking elements from this project even further, the artist painted a self-portrait as Warhol’s ‘Double Elvis,’ only instead of being armed with pistols, as Elvis is in the original painting… Bienko holds the Koons-emblazoned Louboutins, looking prepared to use them as weapons.”
Desire, or more precisely, frustrated desire, is the theme of the stiletto piece, wrote Michael Swellander in TPR Arts, an arts and culture blog.
“He hopes that the sight of high-end footwear will arouse longing in the viewers, and because the shoes are not for sale, virtually unobtainable, force them to reflect upon that feeling,” wrote Swellander. “Their location behind the window pane has the effect of a retail display full of products one may look at, but not touch.”
In 2010, "TehChing Hsieh" and "LeWitt, Sol," a music video by Bienko, made the short list in an international creative video contest co-sponsored by New York's internationally renowned Guggenheim Museum.
His video was one of 125 selected from more than 23,000 entries to advance in the contest, "YouTube Play, A Biennial of Creative Video," sponsored by the museum and YouTube in collaboration with Hewlett-Packard and Intel.
Bienko’s work antagonizes history, fashion, critical theory, the impossibility of desire and the value of art in the age of Post Production. He is involved in challenging solutions, eradicating answers and encouraging inconsistencies in an effort to calculate meaning.
More information about Bienko’s show is available at the Artpace website, www.artpace.org. Artpace is located at 445 N. Main in San Antonio, Texas.
Swellander’s review of the show is online at tprarts.blogspot.com.
The Current’s coverage of the show can be accessed at blogs.sacurrent.com and calendar.sacurrent.com.
The Current's detailed review of the Artpace exhibit is available online at
sacurrent.com/arts/.
"TehChing Hsieh" and "LeWitt, Sol" is available on Youtube.
- Posted: Jan. 20, 2011 -
Contact: Phillip Rollfing, prollfing@archone.tamu.edu or 979.458.0442.