Lot 165: Rita Ackermann (Hungarian/American, born 1968) I didn't screw it up ...did I? 1995 oil on canvas 132 by 184 cm. 51 15/16 by 72 7/16 in. This work was executed in 1995.

I didn't screw it up ...did I?
1995

oil on canvas
132 by 184 cm.
51 15/16 by 72 7/16 in.
This work was executed in 1995.

PROVENANCE
Interim Art, London
Acquired directly from the above by the present owner in 1995

"That female figure is part of my language. She is as abstract as Pinocchio or Bambi. It is a pop icon about fragility, not sexuality."
The artist in conversation with Olivier Zahm, PURPLE FASHION magazine, Issue 13, Summer 2010

Traditionally trained in drawing at the University of Fine Arts in Hungary, Rita Ackermann moved from Budapest to New York in 1992 to study drawing at the New York Studio School of Drawing, Painting and Sculpture. She would later become an integral part of the city's Lower East side's underground art world. It is there that she began incorporating new techniques such as spray painting and collage to her repertoire, and diversified her practice into performance art, including puppeetering and music.
I Didn't Screw Up... Did I ? is characteristic of Ackermann's visual imagery, which is populated with barely pubescent girls, easily recognisable by their exagerated doe-like eyes. In the painting the female figure is facing the viewer, a sack of money in her right hand and a rifle in her left in what seems to be an escape from a bank robbery. There is a clear tension between the expected innocence of the young figure running towards the viewer and the violence of her action, with the title of the painting only emphasizing their ambiguous relationship. The viewer's position is unclear, almost shifting between that of a witness and that of an accomplice.