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An exhibit of the President’s daughter Ivanka Trump has recently opened in DC’s Flashpoint Gallery in a little less than respectable form. She’s seen wearing a pink business suit, pumps and accessorized with a vacuum. Titled “Ivanka Vacuuming,” a giant pile of dirt sits in front of the statue where women are encouraged to throw dirt at the first daughter.
“The viewer throwing crumbs, and Ivanka vacuuming them, is not a stand-in for one feeling, one relationship or one point of view toward this powerful and sexualized female form,” the release says. “It is intentionally open to multiple, often contradictory interpretations that are as critical of the interpreter as they are of the subject.”
The artist, Jennifer Rubell says the piece is “complicated,” stating that people enjoy throwing dirt at the piece. “That is the icky truth at the center of the work. It’s funny, it’s pleasurable, it makes us feel powerful, and we want to do it more.”
It’s “simultaneously a visual celebration of a contemporary feminine icon; a portrait of our own relationship to that figure; and a questioning of our complicity in her role-playing,” she went on to say.
“The viewer throwing crumbs, and Ivanka vacuuming them, is not a stand-in for one feeling, one relationship or one point of view toward this powerful and sexualized female form. It is intentionally open to multiple, often contradictory interpretations that are as critical of the interpreter as they are of the subject.”
Ivanka wasn’t exactly amused by any of it, retweeting a story about the installation saying “Women can choose to knock each other down or build each other up. I choose the latter.”
To be honest, as creative and cynical the piece is, if we were being completely honest, the model really looks nothing like Ivanka. And while Rubell studied art in Harvard, perhaps she should have studied a little harder. Also, it would be nice if the creatives in Washington weren’t so predictable in their work and realized that their perpetual use of the President’s name to boost their careers also helps his.
Photo Credit: Ryan Maxwell Photography
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