Painted in 2019, Sanya Kantarovsky’s Bud 5 is a sardonic retelling of one of America’s most infamous broadcasting incidents. The title of the piece refers to R. Budd Dwyer, acting treasurer for the State of Pennsylvania during the 1980s. In a 1987 video that has gone down in US-television history, Dwyer committed suicide at a press conference by shooting himself live on air - after having been convicted on counts of conspiracy, fraud and racketeering.i Capturing one of the last moments of Dwyer’s life, Kantarovsky describes “I love the contradiction of this guarding, tender safekeeping gesture, while he wields an instrument of death”.ii
Kantarovsky is inspired by the melancholic, surrealist literature of the early 20th Century European authors such as Franz Kafka and Mikhail Bulgakov and his work plays upon the absurd, ironic humour of a tragic situation.iii Broad, painterly brushstrokes and cool shades of blue watercolour are used to add a ghostly feel to the piece, reminiscent of works by Edvard Munch. The effect is one which is typical of Kantarovsky’s dark humour, seeking to embrace the uncomfortable nature of the joke.
