Mumma Mummies

I happened to be at the Bloomington Arts Center yesterday and I checked out The Mummy Paradox, a rather bizarre collection of clay multicolored mummies.

The first thing you notice when you enter the gallery is a group of 50 mummified cats all facing one direction. They stand upright, and in front of them is a little mouse that I almost stepped on because I didn't notice it. It's a whimsical piece, almost cartoonish. Like much of the exhibit, I felt like the artists were playing and having fun with their theme.

Many of the pieces consist of miniature clay mummies housed inside of "reworked vintage printer trays" (as the artists say in their notes on the piece). Denise Rouleauf and Mark D. Roberts seem to be playing with the idea of pattern. The mummy figures, configured in their drawers, or lined up on pillars, seem to be waiting for the afterlife as if that moment will occur in a very categorical and organized way. There is something quite unnerving about all the little embalmed figures grouped together, even when the figures are bright blue or some other vibrant color.

In some of the pieces, such as "Crucifix", Christian images are juxtaposed with the Egyptian motif. Similarly, some of the mummies take the shape of Catholic cardinals or monks. Perhaps the artists are trying to point to the universality of death- that while beliefs and rituals surrounding death vary from one belief system/ culture to another, we all ultimately end up in the same place.

While the mummies often made me go "aw!" with how cute they were, there was also something frightening about them all lined up together. The program notes indicate that the artists were attempting to explore "the magnitude of generations; the significance of ritual; and the notion of individual identity within the broader scope of the human condition." I think they carried off their goal fairly well- there definitely was a feeling of a sacred space in the gallery. However, at the same time, I felt that the comedy evident in some of the pieces (the mummy gumball machine, for example) took away from more serious questions that the artists seem to be asking.