Despite a (potentially) interesting central character and a genuinely confrontational and uncomfortable opening scene, this feature from artist and film-maker Martine Syms spins its wheels dramatically, with indulgent, undirected performances and ideas. It is archly knowing about the art world, yet never quite earns its putative status as satire: a movie about someone graduating from art school that itself feels like a graduation project.
The contemporary artist and writer Diamond Stingily (who has collaborated with Syms on other work) plays Palace Bryant, a young woman of colour about to undergo a viva voce exam from an uptight panel of advisors as part of her MFA degree. Some of them are supportive, some uneasy and one is openly sceptical about Palace’s claims to be creating work that engages with her African heritage. “Where’d you grow up?” she asks pointedly, a question to which Palace responds by calling her a racist. Yet later, at the graduation party, there will be hilariously derisive talk among Palace’s friends about other people’s claims to authenticity: “She’s not from Belarus – she’s from Las Vegas!”
