#deconstructivecriticism

This week Cody Smith critiques Surogat (Ersatz), by Dušan Vukotić:

Okay, so I don’t really believe in reviewing a piece of visual art that I haven’t seen in person (technology might be advanced but looking at a painting or sculpture from a computer screen seems pretty ineffective) and post-spring break I’ve been spending a lot of time sitting in my room and not going to the wealth of museums here in Philadelphia to brainstorm, so today I thought I’d review a short film, a process which involved me googling “best short films” and weeding through the results, and I ultimately decided on the Croatian animated short Ersatz by Dušan Vukotić, produced by Zagreb Film, which won an Oscar in 1962 for best cartoon short.

This film deals with some god figure/fascist/Donald Trump who inflates a bunch of furniture around him for the perfect day at the beach. This furniture even includes the woman he inflates to keep him company (he even adds some extra air to ensure that his female companion is “filled out” to his specifications). This dude IS the patriarchy and he basically tries to manipulate the woman into falling in love with him (this guy has NOT properly learned about consent). He’s also like a 4 trying to get with a 9, and if Tinder has taught me anything, it’s that a 2-point discrepancy maximum lies in the realm of possibility (I’m a 6 looking for my 8). I found myself hoping for this guy’s downfall, and luckily in this film, even god figures can fall victims to accidents. (I thought about beginning this piece with “The best-laid plans of mice and men...” etc. but I don’t think even I’m pretentious enough to think I could get away with that.) Vindication tasted so sweet.

This week Susanna Buff critiques “Ultraviolence”:

A friend sent me this poem because his teacher/advisor/friend wrote it. I read it and instantly was reminded of my pediatric nursing class, which sometimes seems like a three-hour lecture on how many ways kids can get hurt. We tend to think of children as small and weak, but in reality they’re dramatic, chaotic, and as this poem so clearly puts, very much violent. They’re brutally honest, and they’ve yet to be trained by the world to tone themselves down, reel it in, and control themselves. This sounds dumb as I’m thinking it but it is what this poem made me feel and this is the point of this column, but low-key I think children are the only ones who have the full human experience, because they haven’t learned otherwise yet. 

This week, Susanna Buff critiques Maya Angelou’s “Awakening in New York”:

I’m from New York, where I commuted every morning of high school on the subway and later the metro north. I’m used to early mornings, 6 am (or earlier) wake-up calls, crowded train cars, and forcing myself along despite how tired I might feel. Those mornings I would have beautiful posters with those poem on it to cheer me on, but since I’ve been in Philadelphia I’ve had to do it myself. I like to think of this though because everything can seem hard in the morning, but I like how this presents the image of force, unprecedented and without consideration for how languid the rest of the world might be. It’s the second half of a spring semester, and I think we all could use this idea as motivation to get through the next few weeks and finish strong. We’re tired, like the curtains we also don’t want to be pushed around by the wind, we need straps or supports to hold us up, but we shouldn’t give in to this. Let’s be the alarm instead, dominating, pushing through the early morning haze.

This week, Cody Smith critiques Covenant by Alexander Liberman, 1975:

This week, Susanna Buff critiques James Reidel’s “Miley Cyrus or Manatee?”:

I like manatees but I don’t like Miley Cyrus. That said, I love this poem. The reference of the creature as empty, lacking real substance, and murky paints a picture of worthlessness. “Washed up” in this context could mean either outdated and untalented or literally washed ashore. The comparison of a manatee’s mistaken identity of a mermaid and Miley’s presence in the media as a celebrity/”trainwreck” is both sad and beautiful—a reference to a glittery and mystical past compared to the sad truth of today. I don’t think of my dislike of Miley is representative of this large-scale comparison, but I do think it speaks volumes about what a difference society’s perception of an object or person can make to an individual.

This week, Susanna Buff critiques Gerald Fleming’s poem “Long Marriage”:

HEY HOMIES sus is back in the game. Your homegirl here has been thinking a lot about relationships lately (~recently dumbed~ vibes, u feel) and honestly this poem gets it. I think a lot of us youths feel that relationships are all about passion or excitement or /connecting/, and I also think it’s really natural for people at our stage to be worried about the future. Will this last? Will it be worth it? Am I wasting my time? But at the end of the day all we really want is support. We want someone we can tell everything to, as anything of, and not worry about being judged. We want someone to be an extension of ourselves. That sounds v dramatic, but I think it’s a lot less dramatic than we make it out to be. This poem does a great job of showing that just the little parts of sharing your thoughts can e enough, and that the peace that comes from that commitment can be better than any therapy. It reminds me that stressing about relationships is useless, because relationships shouldn’t be about stress. This poem is telling us to chill t f out and I dig it. 

This week, Susanna Buff’s deconstructive critique is of “Mary and Her Child,” a fourteenth-century poem with no known author:

My friend is abroad and recently purchased a book of fourteenth-century poetry and challenged me to one of them. Let’s DO IT. This poem is clearly written in old English, which is a subject I have zero experience with. I noticed that the author uses “cum” instead of “come,” which in today’s vocabulary gives it a very sexual flavor despite the actual text telling a different story. An initial read through reveals Mary, wondering how her tiny baby can be not only the son of God, but God Himself (for all the non Christians out there, this is Mary’s perspective- not tryna preach 2 u). The most incredible part is how baby Jesus responds to his mother and tells her that it’ll all be okay because some kings are going to bring presents.  It’s a clear image of Mary as the classic mother/woman, amazed at her son and needing material proof that he really is who she believes he is. Even though the man in this is a baby, it is still the man who tells her it will be okay and tells her what to do. Jesus is presumably a whole day old in this and already commanding her. And she listens. It’s an interesting power dynamic. Also, the “cum” v “come” thing adds a whole element of innuendo in today’s world that gives it an interesting vibe.