Bloomberg.com reports that Shaquille O’Neal is curating a show for the FLAG Art Foundation,
Moonlighting for the first time as a curator, O’Neal is overseeing “Size DOES Matter,’’ an exhibition on the theme of scale in contemporary art coming in February to New York’s nonprofit Flag Art Foundation.
“New York is the art capital, so I’m pleased to be starting at the top,’’ O’Neal, 37, said in an e-mail interview. “It was a little harder than I thought it would be. When you think about what each of the artists put into their work, what they are expressing and want to share with the world, you feel bad about having to narrow it down.’’ He said he chose pieces he “can relate to.’’
Gimmicks or not, I think pairing major names like Shaquille O’Neal with contemporary art shows can be a great way to help art gain new audiences. No stranger to gimmicks himself, semi-fictional author James Frey had this to say,
“This won’t be like another nice show at MoMA or the Met,’’ Frey said, referring to New York’s Museum of Modern Art and the Metropolitan Museum of Art. “Getting Shaq, one of the largest people in the world, to curate a show about scale is really fun. He does a lot of things that are unconventional for a guy of his stature.’’
I’m interested to see what, if anything, comes of this. Will people scoff at a basketball star’s taste? Will people celebrate the move? Will the event garner larger audiences just because Shaq’s name is attached? Probably. But can Shaq do for contemporary art what he has done for other brands? Probably not.
