"In spite of its considerable reputation, I’ve never been particularly enamored of the work of Marlene Dumas. She demonstrates a marked propensity for marrying lugubrious themes (like portraits of drowning victims) to a thin, Neo-Expressionistic paint-handling that seems extraneous to the images involved; meanwhile, her palette tends to fall in the spectrum between bruised flesh and dried blood, urine stains and sour milk. The trouble with this package is not that it’s unlovely, but that ultimately, it is unconvincing. Dumas lays claim to a gravitas that feels more assumed than earned, as she often confuses self-importance for a deep unpacking of the human condition. The result is a mannered muddle that hits you over the head with significance."

Howard Halle review in Time Out of Dumas' show at Zweriner







"I paint because I am a woman.
(It's a logical necessity.)
If painting is female and insanity is a female malady, then all women painters are mad and all male painters are women.
I paint because I am an artificial blonde woman.
(Brunettes have no excuse.)
If all good painting is about color then bad painting is about having the wrong color. But bad things can be good excuses. As Sharon Stone said, "Being blonde is a great excuse. When you're having a bad day you can say, I can't help it, I'm just feeling very blonde today."
I paint because I am a country girl.
(Clever, talented big-city girls don't paint.)
I grew up on a wine farm in Southern Africa. When I was a child I drew bikini girls for male guests on the back of their cigarette packs. Now I am a mother and I live in another place that reminds me a lot of a farm - Amsterdam. (It's a good place for painters.) Come to think about it, I'm still busy with those types of images and imagination.
I paint because I am a religious woman.
(I believe in eternity.)
Painting doesn't freeze time. It circulates and recycles time like a wheel that turns. Those who were first might well be last. Painting is a very slow art. It doesn't travel with the speed of light. That's why dead painters shine so bright.
It's okay to be the second sex.
It's okay to be second best.
Painting is not a progressive activity."

-Marlene Dumas

i feel kinda weird about what i said earlier so i'm sorry.

"what did you say i can't remember?"




apologize for something that i thought but never said
brings it out anyway
so in the end i'm still a bitch

Why the fuck Big don't want me?

I think I prefer to party by myself.

I decided that Beyonce is a much better role model than Mariah. I mean riight?

dapper young players
poor boys and girls how your
ego must exhaust you


you will not find the raging of art in its puberty here