First Review of ‘The Flame and the Flower’
Knight Arts Reviews ‘The Flame and the Flower’
Chip Schwartz reviews The Flame and the Flower and sees Marc Blumthal’s work as an “[examination] of American culture by way of appropriated and altered images from Google.” Schwartz spends most of his review dealing with the text written on the wall of the gallery and the Marc Blumthal doppelganger piece. Of the text, Schwartz interprets that it is an edit of a speech made my former President George W. Bush right after 9/11:
[It] stands as a testament to the bold and sweeping rhetoric that politicians utilize to sway the masses. Oftentimes both a display of power and an appeal to familiarity, such speeches serve to satiate listeners with what they want to hear as well as assert dominance.
And of the doppleganger piece, he writes:
One of the most amusing works here is entitled “Punching a Common Mistake (Mark Blumenthal) In The Face.” Clearly, with a name like ‘Marc Blumthal,’ the artist must encounter a great many misinterpretations of his name and the parenthetical segment of the title provides an example. Having Google-searched his doppelgänger, Blumthal printed the imposter’s face on a sheet of aluminum and subsequently punched (or otherwise smashed) in the front of the image in a show of protest and frustration. Although the Internet provides us with a never-ending stream of information, it also allows for the unpleasant possibilities of stalking, mistaken identity, or a general lack of privacy, among others. Individuality may be important to the American spirit, but in a sea of names, it can be easy to feel swallowed up.
Bravo, Marc! And thank you, Chip Schwartz, for another great review of the work being done in NAPOLEON.
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