Julie Heffernan

Browsing around tonight, I ran across this scathing description of a show in New York months ago by Julie Heffernan. It goes:

At long last we mounted the steep stairs to PPOW to see Julie Heffernan's latest show, Booty. After walking around a bit I said to Stephanie, "Old Master technique and topless women. So how come I'm not excited?"

"Yeah, what's wrong with you?" she shot back.

But that pretty much summed it up. Two years ago I'd have been blown away by this show, but last night I was just unimpressed. Julie's a good painter, an excellent painter, with technique to spare. But that's all there is. I asked Stephanie if she liked the work.

"I think I do," she allowed, "but I'm not sure I understand it."

What's not to understand? A nauseous, naked Uma Thurman stands half-buried in dead animals. How much clearer can Julie's theme be?

Actually, I think Julie's theme is more obvious than that. I think she's aiming to create ART. Not regular old art, that is, but ART, something a well-to-do person can buy which is very definitely A PAINTING. Whatever else you might say about these, they're certainly PAINTINGS. No question. They're big, they're made of paint, and they don't make sense. They must be ART! No one will walk into your well-appointed home and say, "My kid could paint that!" No one will squint at it with puzzlement and say "You paid how much for this?" No: This is so unequivocally ART everyone will simply accept it and your good taste for buying it.

In other words: This is a couple of paintings from Sears for people who shop on Fifth Avenue.

After reading such harsh words, I had to know what these paintings looked like! What could "ART" possibly look like, and why were these paintings in particular given such a dismissive blow-off?

Clicking the link brought me to the show in question -- full of sickly nude women clad in dead game animals and fruit. All of the paintings seemed to be pretty much the same; the same idea at least, carried through in different environments or with different intentions. However, the reviewer seemed to be right -- they didn't seem to make sense.

Then, I remembered a painting that I had seen in the National Gallery of Art once and things start to click.

This is that painting. (It struck me so much when I first saw it that I happened to take a picture! Lucky!)

Now... when I see this painting, I think vanitas still life -- showing the bounty yet despair of life and its fragility. This concept of bounty is what I believe that Heffernan is getting at... I mean damn, the show was called "Booty." Obviously, even if it is a bit contrived, the paintings were all meant to serve as allegories for the idea of bounty, and whatever that means in this age.

As opposed to when these icons first appeared, I believe that bounty has a new meaning. In olden days, I suppose having a goose and a rabbit would be quite bountiful; however, I could go out and get both of those things right now with less work than when that painting was made. Simply having one goose and one rabbit is not bountiful in today's society -- no... one must have MANY. I believe Heffernan takes the old ideas of bounty and pushes them towards complete and utter excess. Bounty becomes booty as it accumulates at her central figures' feet and essentially dress the lower half of the figures' bodies.

I can see meaning in that. I see that as being more than an intent to sell "ART" or "PAINTINGS."

Perhaps it's my own internal optimist, but I like to believe that Heffernan is actually trying. I like to believe that these oppulent paintings are more than just wall-decorations, and perhaps are commenting on the availability and excessiveness of the contemporary wealthy -- those same people who are in the budget to buy her work. Perhaps she's clever -- perhaps it's a joke on them.

Who knows though.