"Drawings are closer and quicker in conveying immediate feelings"
—Marlene DumasIn Little Red Riding Hood Marlene Dumas utilizes the fairytale as a common reference to explore the nuances of morality in contemporary culture and politics. In her depictions of characters from fables, Dumas invokes the metaphoric weight of their characters and the moral ambiguities at the root of their stories. While moral ambiguity may not be the first trait one associates with fairytales, their emphasis of cruelty and retribution as the condition for living “happily ever after” does indeed provide the grounds for a nuanced social scrutiny. Tying this to Dumas’ upbringing, curator Ingrid Schaffner relates “[her] art repeatedly recounts what was, for her, the essential experience of learning first-hand what it means to be white under apartheid in South Africa.” Analogizing the artist’s biography, “discovering the dubiousness of being “fairest in the land” of South Africa entailed a loss of innocence.”i
In a manner distinct to Dumas, questions regarding the virtues and evils of our socio-psychic existence are drawn into the work. Her four depictions from Little Red Riding Hood provide distinct artistic treatments to characters from the centuries-old folk tale, ranging from the innocent line drawing of Little Red Riding Hood going for a walk, to the more heavily handled ink of the wolf disguised as the grandmother. Her idealization of Little Red with blonde curls is counterargued by the foreboding darkness surrounding Little Red “anticipating the wolf.”
