(Danny McDonald at House of Gaga)
The toy/action-figure has become a major feature in art.
From Steinbach’s belief in the formal beauty of the product, to Harrison’s abuse of their semantic connotation - demolitioning of meaning - and the cargo-cult pickings arranged as marxist totems, toys now bespeak a Pop-freudian analysis, dredging up the subconscious of culture - a C-3PO with robot tits, an Alien brain tumor, Schwarzenegger slurping a pink dick, the monster made to hold a mirror to itself; that, like a Jim Shaw pop-surrealism in Cady Noland means, becoming assemblage Rorscharchs of what this culture could possibly mean, and fun to boot, the hot new item on everyone's list surely.
See also: Pentti Monkkonen at High Art, Flat Neighbors at Rachel Uffner, Jim Shaw at Metro Pictures, Mathis Altmann at Freedman Fitzpatrick, “Puddle, pothole, portal” at Sculpture Center
