Stinking with Sin
Jim Shaw
American, born 1952
(1981)
A ghostly, cartoonlike figure rendered in airbrush and pencil on paper that uses childlike imagery to caricature moral panic and private anxieties.
At first you notice the soft, smoky airbrush washes paired with sharp, folded planes that assemble a distorted humanoid studded with round blemishes, wavy vapor lines, and a tiny dangling silhouette, an effect both playful and menacing.
Dating from 1981, the work is typical of Jim Shaw’s move to fold vernacular cartoons, lowbrow humor, and confessional surrealism into contemporary art, helping open a space for narrative irony and cultural critique in the 1980s.
Medium
Pencil and airbrush on paper
Dimensions
13 1/2 x 10 1/2" (34.2 x 26.5 cm)
Classification
Department
Credit
Gift of the Friends of Contemporary Drawing
Accession
26.1999
Palette
Art Terms
Exhibitions
