Malkovich, Che

Now THAT is a face that I would wear on a t-shirt!

It’s from a great Sandro Miller series of portraits of actor and icon John Malkovich in costume as various famous portrait subjects. No Queen Elizabeth, but there is that poor Depression era mother from the Dorothea Lange series. The creepy twins from Diane Arbus.

And Albert Einstein. The one with the tongue.

On a serious note, the project asks interesting questions about power, identity and iconography. And, not incidentally, accessories too. Where does the identity lie in the visual image: in the subject, in the referent, in the outfit, in the pose? How do we make meaning from the impact of light rays on receptor cells, and is any one particular meaning superior to another? At what point is it a picture of a movie star instead of a reference to a famous historical figure? Given that the originals on which these are based were all deliberately posed shots, where does “authenticity” lie, if it’s not just a pretty dream?

Categories: Art, Humor, Identity, Media, Movies, News, Politics, Weird