Artworks

TEXAS BEAUTY QUEEN CREAMS

Texas beauty Queen Creams present a stark perspective on cosmetic retailing. In the work, beauty cream jars are arrayed in rows, apparently identical except for the advertising slogans–all taken from actual products–on their labels. The promise of confidence is the mass-marketer’s act of repressive desublimation, taking away what it seems to be offering. In assembling these ostensibly demure labels, Hovnanian reveals the oppressiveness behind the insinuations of liberation espoused by the beauty industry.

Texas Beauty Queen Cream (Fix your face for good), 2023