Any Way Up. Acrylic Pop Art Painting on Canvas
Doug takes the familiar and turns it on its head. The piece can be inverted and hung any way up, with the text “Cha-Cha-Cha” remaining legible in both orientations.
Neither figure appears to be dancing, let alone performing the Cha-Cha-Cha, although the man may have been caught mid “Cha”.
The woman, by contrast, seems to be fleeing, glancing nervously over her shoulder. Both poses evoke tension rather than rhythm.
Vertical coloured bars overlay the scenes, directing attention to the figures while reinforcing a structural symmetry that allows for inversion.
Three broad bands appear to enclose the woman, almost forming a box, and possibly favouring the orientation in which she is upright.
*Artist Doug Kemp with Any Way Up painting
Because of the painting’s reversible nature, left and right are ambiguous, leaving colour as the defining cue: yellow for the woman and pink for the man.
This reverses a familiar convention of “pink for a girl”, although the fleeing woman is clearly no Barbie Girl.
The painting functions as both artwork and emotional barometer, capable of being hung according to the viewer’s mood.
Any Way Up reflects Doug’s wit and design instinct, turning “Cha-Cha-Cha” from a carefree phrase into something more unstable and ambiguous.
