Symbols Study #2 1970

Curator: Well, look at this striking mixed-media artwork titled "Symbols Study #2" by Benny Andrews, created back in 1970. What's your initial gut reaction? Editor: It feels unsettlingly…theatrical? Like figures on a very crowded stage, almost cartoonish, yet there’s something genuinely disturbing about that wide grin. Curator: Yes! The smile does seem intentionally unsettling, even sinister against the backdrop of those oddly juxtaposed symbols. Speaking of, to me the safe, the roses, the vacant figure with the book--it reads like a checklist of classic symbols subverted somehow. Editor: Absolutely. Roses signify love, a safe represents security... But Andrews places them in a context that challenges those straightforward interpretations. The female figure is unreadable; is she complicit or oblivious? The blank expression... Curator: Right, is she reading an inventory of goods being kept in the safe, the man smirking knowing more than she? His stance atop the safe, which itself is sitting on wheels, evokes a false sense of security and an economic bubble waiting to burst. It feels intensely political, even predictive given when Andrews made it. It gives the feeling of an out of tune carnival ride. Editor: And that rug! All of that geometric abstraction, like so much noise beneath their feet...it might suggest cultural dislocation, the loss of traditional moorings. All this considered within a painting that features elements of collage… there’s a fracturing here. He's collaging symbols themselves. Curator: The mix of oil and acrylic with the pasted elements reinforces that. A disruption of expected materials adds another layer to this complex tableau. Did you say that Andrews creates theater within the viewer with such simple shapes and composition! The symbolism pulls us towards so many conflicting feelings... Editor: Exactly. I see layers and fragments: cultural anxieties expressed through archetypal forms… I appreciate its power of the social critique hidden beneath familiar images that leave more questions than answers Curator: I couldn’t agree more, there’s more questions here than any clear answers and its up to us to figure it out and perhaps question what images we associate to ideals ourselves! It really asks the viewer for introspection.