Kirsty Whiten - Votive Icons
A trompe l'oeil image of fingers penetrating what look likes a vagina which also looks a wee bit like an elephant
Already voted in the top twenty of Scottish Artists to invest in for her feral lingerie model paintings, contrasting the poses of a carnal glamour model with the behaviour of a pack of wild wolves, Whiten takes a sideways step for this exhibition. She was kicked out of Pittenweem Art Festival for offending church goers and unsuprisingly, the paintings on show are downright rude, with a trompe l'oeil image of fingers penetrating what look likes a vagina which also looks a wee bit like an elephant. The images use repeated organic motifs, mostly hands, in conjunction with distorted, disturbing images of conjoined twins or bizarre totems. Although I doubt I could afford one, Whiten's work is itself fetishistic whilst actually being a fetish itself, the most purchasable of work which also is reverberant with unsettling content. An impressive sideways step from a continually fantastic artist. [Jasper Hamill]