The Man in the Pink Dress 2019

Curator: Right, here we have Valeria Duca's "The Man in the Pink Dress," painted in 2019. An oil painting full of contradictions, isn't it? Editor: My first thought? Vulnerability. It’s palpable. The man's posture, the way he clutches the dress… it all screams a beautiful sort of fragility. But there's something off-putting about how the brushstrokes delineate folds of that very specific dress. I want to reach out and tug at them. I'm feeling some serious dissonance in all this materiality. Curator: Absolutely. There's the stark contrast between the subject and the attire. This dress appears both alluring and slightly awkward on him, playing with notions of masculinity and femininity in ways that feel like more than just simple role reversal. It is clear how the traditional craft of oil painting adds a contemporary sense of gender politics. Editor: Exactly! The oil paint is critical here, in my opinion. It gives this weight, this… historical context to what could otherwise be a fleeting image. And consider the work of anonymous seamstresses and other textile artists over time. Their efforts often go unacknowledged when these kind of paintings are perceived as 'fine art', but if you look closely you notice their stitches and labor. Curator: That is something to consider, the way the labor becomes enmeshed and coded in materials that signify cultural roles of women! For me, though, it's also the story implied, the ‘why’ behind it all that's compelling. There's almost a narrative element suggested through composition and use of color. Editor: And what's up with the painting behind him? It seems a copy of Hendrikje Stoffels by Rembrandt but what does it signify? Curator: Good catch, yes! Almost like a conversation between art historical subjects and figures and art itself. But tell me, are you reading into any emotional meaning coded in colors and figures? Editor: Well, pink is culturally laden, no? With all sort of complex connotations linked with fashion. Yet here in this context it appears as just the kind of thing that offers the painting both humor and a somber mood. Almost, a moment to make you cry. It all hangs in the balance. Curator: Agreed, a bittersweet tenderness indeed! Editor: Thinking about materiality, I am so into the roses too, almost a counterweight to that vulnerability that I found appealing when I first gazed at it. Curator: Thank you. The work certainly challenges conventional interpretations. Editor: My pleasure! It does encourage one to challenge what we have been taught, especially now.