
I watch every reality TV competition show on air right now (it seems), and Work of Art is definitely the best of the bunch. The catty artists, the idiocy of both the contestants and the judges and the seriousness with which some of them take their work makes for awesome, awesome entertainment. Plus, now they've added in a $20,000 challenge last week, and a $30,000 challenge this week. It's good.
This week's challenge includes the final eight contestants pairing off to create street art underneath the Brooklyn bridge on four spaces on a red brick wall. The pairing is random, so the teams either clash or work together well from the beginning.
Sara J. and Kymia are paired together and end up making a cool wall representing immigration and being uprooted by a faceless, greedy source. They paint a three-headed black tree with its roots flying being carried by a white man to a new spot. The piece is large-scale and looks good from far away.
Dusty and Young create an extremely literal, but interesting piece. Dusty just became a father, and Young just lost his, so they put both of their faces on the wall in conversation. They create two staircases and a black thought bubble which allows viewers to insert their opinions on the wall in pastel chalks.
Sarah K. and the Sucklord seem to work well together, but create something much more boring than the Sucklord's name and attire would predict. It's a maze on the wall with randomly placed wooden pieces jutting from the original painted maze. This is supposed to make it look visually appealing from different angles, but it doesn't translate. They place a mouse on one end of it, and a piece of cheese at the other end.
Michelle and Lola make everyone hate them even more with an idiotically-conceived creation of dominatrix tigers that look exactly like Chester Cheetah. They do make stickers that viewers can take and stick elsewhere, which is pretty interesting. The judges, save Pulitzer Prize-winning (?!?!) Jerry Saltz, don't like it. I can't wait until Lola isn't young and minx-like--she's cocky because she's cute--and elderly judge Saltz won't love everything she does because he imagines getting into her pants.
The winners are Young and Dusty because the audience was so engaged with their piece. They split $30,000 this week, and Dusty is excited because is from Arkansas and poor. Young is also poor because he is an artist.
I hope they give away more money next week. It brings out the bitchiness in everyone.
