The Reality Shows

March 7, 2011
Finley (Shock Treatment) begins this showcase of recent work—performance, installation, conceptual, and visual art—with "Make Love," an homage to post-9/11 New York via "a cabaret-driven, lounge-style act that channels Liza Minnelli," who is used as a stand-in for the city and also to soften the subject for the audience. "The Passion of Terri Schiavo" allows Finley to examine the "political, ethical, and moral dilemmas" of the case, resulting in a feverish mantra told from multiple perspectives. The amusing "George and Martha" imagines a love affair between George W. Bush and Martha Stewart as a highly-eroticized Freudian romp both disturbing and hilarious. In her foreword, Hanna recalls an early show by Finley as "the most intensely vulnerable, perfectly crafted performance I'd ever seen," akin to "watching Patti Smith turn into Evel Knievel." Reproducing performance pieces as text, says Hanna, "lets you get at so many other layers of meaning." True, but it also serves as a sort of artistic kryptonite, stripping away what gives Finley much of her power. Illus.