“Serious Vanity,” the title of this three-woman show, refers mostly to its outstanding painting, “Mirror Mirror,” by Cindy Bernhard (born 1989) which portrays Snow White’s stepmother as she studies her face in a late-Rococo-early-Walmart vanity mirror. The green pallor tells us she is jealous, the arched eyebrows tell us she is haughty, the cold stare tells us she is cruel. But what about those cute puppies? They’re in her arms, on her bed and enshrined in framed portraits on her dresser. And what about that low-rent dresser and the queen’s humble headscarf? She’s not really a queen at all—just an ordinary white girl who wants to be loved and is anxious about her status in the kingdom. The narrative quotes a melodramatic fairy tale, but is much more ambivalent about good and evil. The image resembles a Disney animated character, but the painting transcends the tacky craft-store materials that were used in its fabrication. There’s at least as much pathos here as bathos. Rather than hating on the evil queen, we might empathize with those conventional women who feel compelled to compete for value in the eyes of the world.
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