How we'd rework the "Work"

I'm having lots of fun hearing from you guys about "Work of Art." Hey, have you read some of your fellow readers' comments? Here are a few samples from the first two episodes of the reality show.

EP 1

Laurel's enjoying the show, and agrees with many of my art picks as well as my snark about the "villain":

My favorite was the orange portrait - very affecting, not affected! And I do love orange, so that helped. I'm looking forward to more of this, I must admit. Let's see if they get rid of Now next. She's unbearable.

In the premiere, we cannonball into the WoA pool of contestants. A relatively diverse cast, as these things go. But I'm not bothering (at least, not for now) to use their actual names. On this blog, they are: the Villain Nao/Now, Tortured Artist, Starvingartist, the Goofball, the Designated Hotness, the Newb, the Old Lady/the Gray Panther, the Black Guy/ Cartoony Boy,  the Weird White Girl, the Christian, the Effin' Hipster, Hilary Swank's Double, and the Black Girl/The Undercover Misfit.

The judges haven't yet really established their personas, but the host formula is set. SJP (Sarah Jessica Parker) cameos, Switzerland is the main host, and the Designated Expert butts in to distract the artists as they work.

Misfit gets eliminated for an unfocused piece that looks more like a scrapbook paper background than a portrait.

EP 2

So far, most of y'all who've spoken up are tolerating the format for the sake of seeing the art. Michelle says:
I'm still on the fence about this show; I can't decide whether it's a good idea badly executed or just a bad idea all around.

WoA gets on Laurel's nerves for the same reason the other reality shows do: they take each contestant so far outside of their area of expertise:

... so that gradually they bleed all the individuality out of them, and the winner is the one who can do everything well. But...but...why do we need that? There's room in the world for each of us to be outstanding in our field, isn't there? Huh?
But then I guess there wouldn't be any show. Sigh.

Agony abounds in ep 2 for the artist contestants: They're asked to make assemblages out of old electronics, but most of them have little or no experience in 3D art. Some definite standouts, though. Tortured Artist wins partly on the strength of the piece, partly because he's the most melodramatically arty.

This is Tortured's second win. He loosens up enough to mouth off about how "distractingly boring" he finds Hipster's piece, as Evil Greg noted.

Hipster gets eliminated for a piece that was basically three repainted tv sets allegedly communicating with each other.

Don't be shy about commenting! Especially if it's your first time... one of last week's commenters said hi all the way from Malaysia! I'm thinking tomorrow's ep will have a deliberate undercutting twist at the last minute that forces the contestants to redo everything. See you Thursday for the snarkfest.