Anna Uddenberg’s contrived ‘Continental Breakfast’
Anna Uddenberg’s latest exhibition, Continental Breakfast, is currently enjoying its own viral moment after apparently highlighting what it means to be a woman in 2023. But beneath the initial intrigue, her art creates lies a hollow attempt at social commentary that isn’t nearly as successful at channelling feminist thought as it thinks it is.
Her piece, shown at the Meredith Rosen Gallery earlier this year, involves two performance artists, Mădălina Stănescu and Sally von Rosen. Donning something halfway between glamourous (black stiletto heels) and librarian (white uniform-esque blouses), the two artists climb into two of Uddenberg’s sculptures. Backs arched and contorted, they’re face down, physically primed to be gawped at.
The utter lack of nuance doesn’t stop at their hypersexual position either, which does little more than remind the viewer of the DJ Isaac lyric: “Face down, ass up”. The sculptures are each named Premium Economy and T-Top Tommy Tuck. The message is that these women and their bodies are commodities to be ridden and altered.
The sculptures themselves are strange and futuristic, a cobbled-together structure of what looks like handrails and massage chairs. The women assume an odd, unnatural position – so the message must be that women willingly confine themselves like this all the time, routinely stuffing themselves into society’s boxes. Some of them even get tummy tucks, you know!
I believe a big reason her performance piece has garnered millions of views months after its initial showing isn’t because it’s impactful but simply because people don’t know what to make of it. I think, particularly with performance art, there is a nagging sense you need to drink the Kool-Aid and really trust that there’s a more significant message being translated. Critics have rushed to praise its bravery and the way it explores gender politics. Uddenberg herself has described it as a “simulacra”. Ultimately, there are two women bent over, being literally offered up as a meal. It’s tedious.
Gender and sex, and all the associated danger and excitement, have been far better distilled by the likes of Ana Mendieta and Hannah Wilke. Sexuality on display isn’t the issue with Continental Breakfast, but these women entwined their feminist sentiments with their own bodies. While Uddenberg’s chosen two performance artists were obviously willing subjects, it’s a lot easier to make a comment on how readily we sexualise women when you’re not the one bent over in a gallery full of on-lookers.
The message that women are forced to submit to cultural and sexual expectations might be valid, even devastatingly so, but what is the point of repeating that cycle? Uddenberg condemns Stănescu and von Rosen to the exact kind of treatment she seems to be rallying against. “Where can I get one?” asks one commenter. “Extremely disturbing,” jokes another. “How much is the entrance fee? Asking for a friend.” This pessimistic portrayal of womanhood will chime most with the people it seems to be criticising.
