Rosalyn Drexler Love And Violence Analysis

Love and Violence is a work that was painted by Rosalyn Drexler in 1963. When walking through the Albright-Knox Art Gallery, there was an entire exhibit dedicated to Rosalyn Drexler’s work called Who Does She Think She Is? While walking through this exhibit, I saw Love and Violence and I was instantly pulled to it, intrigued by the use of colors and by the drama within the painting itself. Initially it looked like the couple was in a loving embrace, but in further examination of the painting I realized it’s not loving at all. The way the man is grabbing the woman’s neck is controlling. The painting emphasized an abusive physical relationship between a man and woman. Drexler used newspapers and film posters often as the main source of her works. The particular poster that was the main source for Love and Violence was the 1963 poster for the movie Toys in the Attic, starring Dean Martin. The media for this art was acrylic, oil and paper collage on canvas. Drexler’s collage painting of Love and

In Love and Violence she is portraying a private moment between a couple behind closed doors. We don’t know this for sure but the man and woman shown in the work may seem happy and loving outside of this private setting to the outside world. What we can tell from this work is that when this couple is alone he is controlling and uses his physicality to overpower the woman. It was easy to come up with this interpretation of this work based solely off of the title, but after further research it is noted that many works by Drexler revolve around relationships and violence. Although at first it was the colors that caught my eye, Love and Violence was appealing to me because of the use of a basic style of painting to create an abstract image that can be interpreted in so many ways. It has a much deeper meaning than I initially thought by just looking at it