Michael Workman

It's not difficult to read a little Leon Golub into the choppily painted faces of Friese Undine's portraits of world leaders, and the comparison may prove apt. Whereas Golub depicted common people such as his famous war-bitten soldiers, Undine goes for their commanders-in-chief. Though he rejects the suggestion of any "single reading or partisan view" to his art, he may actually be in denial of an amply evident reality. Besides such hot-topic subjects as Bill Clinton, Undine has also pictured gay-rights activist Larry Kramer, Ralph Nader, John Glenn and the Reverend Al Sharpton, to name but a few. Faux political posters also make an appearance in this show. Yet his exhibition "Take Off the Head 2005," opening this weekend at the Chicago Cultural Center, also suggests a desire to decapitate and thus subvert the innate authority of these figures, often presented to us in the mass media as "talking heads" of political dogma. The jury's still out on Undine's artistic motives but, at the very least, his canvases refract the message we've come to associate with their personas through an anti-ideological lens, rendering them mere painting subjects like any other.

Friese Undine shows at the Chicago Cultural Center, 78 East Washington, (312)744-6630. Through April 24.

(2005-02-22)

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