"Smile", 2008, oil on canvas, 60" x 72"
By Patricia Ciaffa Peyser, Huffington Post
January 11, 2011
Barbie's slight but potent form carries five decades of heavy cultural associations on its diminutive shoulders. In her riveting new body of work Drown the Dolls, Daena Title mines that iconic ground for fresh and provocative meaning. Barbie's creator Ruth Handler once commented that she "designed Barbie with a blank face, so that the child could project her own dreams" onto the doll -- and Title's Barbies are captivating vehicles for the projection of her trenchant personal vision.