Goddess of Decadence 

David Michael Bowers painted "Goddess of Decadence," using oil on canvas. Though traditional, the medium is in stark contrast to the painting’s subject matter, which explores the aesthetics of luxury. The artist has carefully rendered a woman adorned with flowers and jewels. Yet, in the foreground, we see a Prada handbag and other luxury accessories. These ready-made items required untold labor to produce, yet appear in the painting as mere status symbols. Bowers is asking us to consider the relationship between the traditional skill of painting and the modern processes of globalized capitalism. Bowers engages with traditions of portraiture while also critiquing our contemporary culture of consumption. By using the slow, deliberate technique of oil painting to depict mass-produced commodities, he invites us to reflect on how such goods acquire meaning. He challenges the conventional hierarchy of art and craft by elevating the everyday and examining the labor and class dynamics that underpin our material world.