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Family Works: A Multiplicity of Meanings and Contexts | http://www.concordia.ca/familyworks
Shary Boyle, The Lute Player, 2010, glazed porcelain, lustre, glass beads, 1/2, 24.5 cm (h.), 23 cm (diam.),
Montreal Museum of Fine Arts. Toronto-based artist Shary Boyle (b. 1972) has spent the last decade working in porcelain as a
complement to her well-developed drawing practice. The Lute Player (2010) is an example of
her more recent interest in creating her own porcelain moulds, as opposed to her adaptation of
rare pre-existing moulds in previous projects. This sculpture portrays an adolescent female
Family Works: A Multiplicity of Meanings and Contexts | http://www.concordia.ca/familyworks
playing an electric guitar, which departs from the traditional natural setting of porcelain
figurines. In this work, Boyle pays homage to the female folk musicians who have inspired her,
although the stylization of the figure's hair is also redolent of headbangers and hyper-masculine
metal culture. The sculpture’s references extend further into the past: its title recalls the
numerous portraits of women playing flutes that were produced from the Renaissance to the
Victorian era. If not explicitly allegorical, these depictions were endowed with sexual
connotations, as talent with the lute was equated with sexual skill. The Lute Player investigates
the traversing of gender lines as well as the crossing of boundaries of sexual acceptability within
adolescence.
Sarah Riley Mathewson