Academic

?How I?d Sink American Vogue?

By Ann Bartow

“How I?d Sink American Vogue” is a project that Scott King developed for a show at New York gallery PS1 last year. Creative Review notes:

His 12 artworks featuring fictional proposals for Vogue covers ruthlessly lampoon the fatuous froth of the glossy. Take January, The Angry Issue: its main feature ? 769 Things That Make Scarlett Johansson Angry At Injustice. Inside, we are promised advice on ?how to dress angry?, a report on ?whatever happened to New Orleans? and ?how Bono saved Africa?.

Carrying on the list obsession is the May issue with 635 Poor People Upside Down [above], plus Karl Lagerfeld on cancer and the lost diaries of Oswald Mosely.

I have very mixed reactions to this. On the one hand, I dislike Vogue very deeply, because to meet it represents a powerful instrument of commodification and othering of women. On the other hand, however, King is making fun of women and “women’s stuff” in a way that strikes me as somewhat misogynist. Check it out and see what you think.

–Ann Bartow

Full post as published by Feminist Law Professors on February 29, 2008 (boomark / email).