Artworks by Bonnie Lee

This group of images are reconstructions of images found in the Metropolitan Museum of Art Birthday Book. They are part of a project that began several years ago as a joke with a friend on her birthday. With the Situationist International project in mind I wondered how many new images could be constructed from just the images in the book. My tools were restricted to an X-Acto knife and rubber cement. The images here are enlarged, digital copies of the "original" collages. In some images the male silhouette has been removed and replaced and in others the female has been superimposed. In some cases, the flip side of an image provides some irony. It is said you cannot use the master's tools to dismantle the master's house. There is some truth in that. By returning to these masterpieces I have in some way reinforced their power. Nonetheless, these images are an attempt to intervene and disrupt the Canon in a way that is irreverent and loving at the same time. I am trying to make peace with my ambivalence. (02/18/96)