Dimensions: 350 x 280 mm
Copyright: © Marcel Dzama, courtesy of David Zwirner, New York | CC-BY-NC-ND 4.0 DEED, Photo: Tate
Curator: This is an untitled work by Marcel Dzama, a contemporary artist born in 1974. He’s known for his distinctive, whimsical drawings, and this piece is part of the Tate Collection. Editor: Immediately, I'm struck by the odd juxtaposition of domestic comfort and surreal unease. The colors are muted, yet the imagery feels unsettling. What is with that head on the chair? Curator: Well, Dzama often uses recurring motifs and characters. Looking closer, the style clearly alludes to early 20th-century aesthetics, but filtered through a distinctly contemporary, almost cynical lens. Consider the gender roles presented... Editor: The head, though, it seems to be a symbol of detached observation. A silent witness to the ennui of modern relationships, the wine bottles signifying decadence. The little monster is… something else entirely. Curator: Absolutely. Dzama creates this space for critiques of social constructs. I would argue he uses the bizarre to reveal some cultural truths that would not be revealed in a conventional artwork. Editor: Yes, a potent blend of domestic drama and symbolic overload. It's that tension that makes this image so compelling, really. Curator: Indeed. It’s a piece that continues to unravel itself, the more time you spend with it.
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This untitled drawing shows a couple relaxing on a green settee, apparently in conversation with a giant head that sits on a wooden chair beside them. Two bottles, with sinister skull-like faces on their labels, and three glasses standing around on the invisible ground beside the feet of the sofa and the couple testify to the social nature of the scene. Two small hands clutch the sofa back; they belong to a character with a fish head that appears to be directing its gaze upwards and away from the adults’ interaction. The style of the couple’s clothing and hair, as well as that of the sofa and chair, belongs to a period somewhere between the 1930s and the 1960s. Wearing a brown suit, a white shirt and a black bow-tie, the man holds up a full glass as though he is about to drink from it and looks attentively in the direction of the head on the chair. His female companion lounges casually back on the sofa smiling up at him. Her shapeless red dress has ridden up on her left thigh to reveal to the top of a grey stocking, while a column of smoke rising from her right hand indicates that she is smoking a cigarette. Mouth open as though in mid-speech, the head looks at the couple with an expression of intense concentration.
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