Victor, Victorious

Victor, Victorious

Cut paper on birch panel. 24 x 30 inches. All rights reserved.

This piece is loosely based on the play The Maids by the French writer Jean Genet. I am also wrestling with issues of patriotism as a guise for aggression.

Genet loosely based his play on the infamous Papin sisters, Lea and Christine, who brutally murdered their employer and her daughter in Le Mans, France, in 1933, although the play is not the story of the Papin sisters as such. Solange and Claire are two housemaids who construct elaborate sadomasochistic rituals when their mistress (Madame) is away. The focus of their theatrical playing is the murder of Madame, and they take turns portraying either side of the power divide. The deliberate pace and devotion to detail guarantees that they always fail to actualize their fantasies by ceremoniously "killing" Madame at the ritual's denouement

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