“‘Anguish’ at Institute of Contemporary Art Offers Cruelty as a Wake-Up Call”
“‘Anguish’ at Institute of Contemporary Art Offers Cruelty as a Wake-Up Call”
by Daniel Kany | Portland Press Herald
November 20, 2016
“Anguish: The Grave Misgivings of Remembrance” is an extraordinarily beautiful and sophisticated exhibition. Curated by Cynthia Nourse Thompson at the Maine College of Art Institute of Contemporary Art, the show is also extremely difficult and could present an emotional overload for visitors. To this point, the show’s title gives fair warning to the depths that do not appear in an initial glance through the handsomely installed galleries.
My experience of “Anguish” was fresh and full of mystery. The forthcoming catalog is not yet available as I write this, and the show’s unadorned labels and lack of explanatory copy leave the work to the viewer’s experience. The conclusions and concerns of “Anguish” creep up with stealth and reveal themselves as emotional earthquakes. The truly haunting jolts, however, arrive as aftershocks.