THE NEW YORKER — Slater Bradley by Andrea Scott

“What more pitiable sight is there than life led astray by art?” This condemation of dilettantes, from the story “Tonio Kröger,” by Thomas Mann, is the opening line in the best of four video projections, all of which rouch on the theme of amateurs and charlatans. The excerpted text is read by ubiquitous hipster Chloë Sevigny (on a windswept beach), which lends an air of irony to the proceedings (before she was an actress, she was an It Girl, famous just for being herself). But Mann’s words resonate, and throughout Bradley sounds the right note of compassion and contempt.