Categorizing art is a significant part of aesthetic experience. To be a fan of science fiction, for example, is to declare a passion not for one work of art, or even for art in general, but for a somewhat nebulous set of tropes and canons. Aesthetics is as much about context as it is about text. Genres and styles help explain what art matters, and what art means.
Max Sansing’s work doesn’t obliterate or struggle against the wood background—rather, it uses the grain as an ironic wink. Well Aware is a portrait of a black woman wearing an expression of exaggerated befuddlement while she stares straight at the viewer. Dabs of green and blue graffiti-esque paint coil around her neck, and a swab of orange is drawn under one eye. Behind her, the shadow outlines of two arrow shafts are painted against the wood background. The piece contrasts, and mocks, different markers of naturalness—the imagined native cultures of Africa or South America and the imagined native cultures of Ikea. The woman in the painting looks like she wants to get away from both. “This is ridiculous,” she seems to say. “Let me out of this stupid (conceptual and actual) wood.”
