Lot 415 | "HANDFUL"

MINTER, MARILYN
1948 Shreveport, LA/USA

Title: "HANDFUL".
Date: 2008.
Technique: Enamel lacquer on metal plate.
Measurement: 153 x 244cm.
Notation: Signed and dated verso: MARILYN MINTER 2008. Here additionally titled.


Provenance:
- Salon 94, New York

Exhibitions:
- Kunsthalle Krems, 2010
- Deichtorhallen/Sammlung Falckenberg, Hamburg 2011

Literature:
- Schoppmann, Wolfgang/Wipplinger, Hans-Peter (eds.); Lebenslust & Totentanz - Olbricht collection, Cologne/Krems 2010, p. 185 (without ill.)
- Luckow, Dirk (ed.): Marilyn Minter, Cologne 2011, ill. p. 19

The American artist Marilyn Minter studied with the photographer Diane Arbus at the University of Florida and at Syracuse University. Since the 1980s, Minter's art has focused on the representation and reception of women in the pop and advertising industries.

It is the series of works "porn grid" with which Minter caused a stir in the international art scene in 1989. Minter shows, stylistically closer to Pop Art than to Photorealism, very explicit scenes from hardcore pornography. But it is precisely this headwind that ultimately leads Minter to focus her attention on the over-sexualized portrayal of women in the pop and advertising industry.

Minter's works are often described as photorealistic. She herself, however, finds this description only partially correct and describes her work more as abstract realism. Winter's working process begins with a digital sketch. Often she combines several individual shots to form a complete picture. In this way, Minter moves in a kind of in-between space, not trying to create an image of reality, but rather to reproduce her fictional vision as realistically as possible. This kind of paradox is more often found in Minter's work. By her own admission, Minter likes to depict two opposing ideas in her works, for example when Minter addresses the reception of pop and advertising icons. The consumer enjoys this way of representation and, among other things, transfers the set standards of beauty to himself, knowing full well that they do not correspond to reality. In her works, Minter sets out to find the reason for this contradictory consumer behaviour.

Marilyn Minter's signature is more than clearly visible in her work "Handful" from 2008. It is the combination of fashion and glamour, with a slightly pornographic undertone, that makes the work fit seamlessly into Minter's oeuvre. With pearl necklaces, pastel colours and pink varnished artificial nails, Minter picks up references from the fashion world in several ways. The drops and wet surfaces so typical of Minter's work can also be identified in the enamel work. Minter prefers the enamel technique, as she claims that human skin can be depicted even more realistically. Small drops can be seen on the fingernails. It remains open, however, whether these are merely water or seminal fluid.

It is not only the incredible talent for painting that makes Minter an exceptional artist. The media and consumer-critical aspects of her work also stand out and, in combination with her special talent for realistic painting, ensure her unique position in the international art landscape. Marilyn Minter never tires of holding up a mirror to the viewer, or rather the consumer, and of recapturing and reinterpreting the over-sexualised and abusive depiction of women in the pop and advertising industry.