What is tastiest about Ronald Caringal’s First Impression Lusts is not the fact that his work is eye candy (w/c is rare in this age of experimentation & since the modernist break-up between art & aesthetics), but the fact that his work is preoccupied w/ underlying linguistic games, revealing a discontentment w/ mere visual punning (the strategy of much advertising, especially print). The show’s title is a testament to this, “Lusts” taking off from the final word in the axiom “First impressions last,” pluralizing lust as if the gallery were showcasing a set of desirable sex objects, in this case objectified women.

Could it be mere coincidence, or intent: The phrase “first impressions” also appears in the album title of a foreign rock band known as The Strokes, whose simple yet catchy chords & lyrics of urban melancholy are popular among the supposedly hip crowd, their name evoking both a gesture w/ strong sexual implications & a serious medical condition that can be worsened by unhealthy eating habits: stroke. Then the line recurs in the tagline “Because first impressions last,” attributed to the also-popular deodorant body spray Axe, internationally acclaimed for its sexy & occasionally campy commercials that feature men becoming irresistible sex objects to bevies of attractive women. Whether the associations are coincidental or intentional is irrelevant; what remains important is the notion that Caringal’s language tends toward this, to fling itself into an openness to associations, w/ the artist providing some kind of conceptual trajectory—w/c is play w/c is the crux w/c is the syllable where playboy (the seeker of girl-related fun) & wordplay (the seeking of girl-related pun) meet, at once literal & figurative.   Continued...