M. Louise Stanley, “The Grand Tour”
by Mark Van Proyen
Anglim/Trimble Gallery, San Francisco, California
Exhibition continues through February 22, 2025
January 25, 2025
M. Louise Stanley, “The Grand Tour,” 2024, acrylic, 36 x 44”. All images courtesy of Anglim/Trimble Gallery.
In a selection of 22 paintings from the past four decades, M. Louise Stanley brings a keen satirist’s eye to her portrayal of Americans acting like stereotypical Americans in the sweltering summer heat of Italy. In other words, the paintings depict buffoonish louts on an international prowl, all avatars of fast food and garish sportswear. They are not the Americans of a century ago, touring Europe to experience and absorb the great monuments of an ancient heritage. Nor are they the youthful backpackers of the 1970s who sought the adventurous fulfillment of breadth requirements that might complement their Liberal Arts degrees. Stanley’s Americans of the first quarter of the 21st century are all on something resembling a vacation, heedless, even proud of their ignorance and bad manners. They are the conquering heroes of an ascendent Trumpgeist, crass beyond repair, comical until we realize that they represent a new phase of the American empire that in all probability will yield very sad results.
M. Louise Stanley, “Bloody Feet,” 2003, gouache, 20 x 14”.
Each of Stanley’s recent paintings feature one or more related figures positioned near fragments of historical architecture or statuary. Often, they have the appearance of families traveling as a group. All are strangely oblivious to their surroundings, even as some of the nearby statue fragments subtly editorialize on their offensive presence. The figures are all representations of white people, their clothing rendered in garish color and flamboyant patterns, sharply contrasting the range of somber grays that describe the statuary. Other paintings are comical re-imaginings of classical art history narratives, updated to reflect contemporary events.
M. Louise Stanley, “The She Wolf,” 2024, gouache, 16 x 12”.
One of the most recent works is “The Grand Tour” (2024), and it is a standout. In a style reminiscent of the burlesque satires Reginald Marsh painted in the 1930s, it depicts a group of five corpulent Americans looking at their cell phones while milling about Rome’s Piazza Navona, which was once Nero’s circus. Faces are a bit obscured while exposed shoulder skin shows signs of sunburn when not covered by scanty tank-tops or clownish baseball caps. In this work, Stanley reveals her eye for telling detail, such as the barely visible top of St. Peter’s Cathedral at the upper right of the picture, or the exaggerated butt crack revealed by the red-capped figure nearest the picture plane.
M. Louise Stanley, “Casting Call for Cautionary Tales,” 2017, acrylic, 72 x 96”.
A smaller gouache titled “Bloody Feet” (2003) shows two pairs of blood-soaked feet — one a part of the Giotto “Crucifixion” located at the Church of Santa Maria Novella, the other belonging to a woman wearing poorly fitting sandals that have drawn blood at their heels. In another gouache titled “The She Wolf” (2024), a bald-headed tourist dressed like a cruise ship passenger stands awestruck in the presence of a statue of a female wolf — Lupa, who nurtured the mythic figures of Rome’s birth, Romulus and Remus — perched atop a pedestal in the center of the Borghese Gallery.
M. Louise Stanley, “Pompeiian Villa,” 1984-85, acrylic on Masonite, papier-mâché, 114 x 144 x 56”.
The largest and most humorous of these paintings is “Casting Call for Cautionary Tales” (2017). In a backstage area of a theater, we see a line-up of stock characters from the old Commedia del’ Arte anxiously preparing to audition for their respective roles. A few seem better suited for a medieval passion play. Here we see Stanley’s consummate painting skills on full display as she balances complex colors and soft and clear focus descriptions of individual characters.
M. Louise Stanley, “Pygmaliana,” 1984, oil, 24 x 33”.
In one corner of the gallery is an older work that can best be called an installation, here reassembled. Titled “Pompeiian Villa” (1984-85), it is a mock-up of the portico of a Roman house from the first century, its walls rendered in a convincing faux finish. Acrylic paint on Masonite and pâpier maché are its constituent materials, conjuring a happy moment prior to the devastating eruption of Mt. Vesuvius in 79 CE. On one of the villa’s walls we see another of Stanley’s paintings from long ago, the 1984 “Pygmaliana,” featuring a female every-artist character looking pixyish and seductive as she embraces a statue of a male figure. What to make of the whole tableau? Pompeii was a wonderful place before it was covered in volcanic lava. It makes it easy to imagine how some future commentator might observe something similar about America prior to its downward spiral into mass insanity after the 2024 election.
