Voltz Clarke and Alexandra Porter
Shane Butler | Will Cooke | Sara Jimenez | Kit Kittle | Natasha Law | Tina Mion |
Jacinto Moros | Lucy Phillips | Robby Rose | Lisa Schulte | Sasha Sykes | Xin-Yi
On View: July 14th – August 10th, 2016
Opening Reception: July 13, 6-8 PM
Location: Voltz Clarke Gallery, 141 East 62nd Street, 2nd Floor, New York, NY 10065
Voltz Clarke and Alexandra Porter presents Flesh: Exercises Beyond Erotica, an exhibition that explores the artists’ and society’s complicated relationship with the body at Voltz Clarke Gallery.
Capable of seduction, repulsion, sin, familiarity, and everything in between, one wonders whether it is
not the eyes, but the flesh that is the window to the soul. Moving beyond traditional portraiture, the
artists featured recognize the body as an access point beyond ordinary sensuality: person (illustrated
identity), place (residence of the soul), and thing (carnal vehicle). Each offers an original explanation for
the ways in which we make sense of ourselves as seer and seen, or, in this case, feeler and felt.
Robby Rose dismantles expectations for prurient portraits, his quiet bathing figure turned away as
identity ripples into easy, subjective isolation – both his and ours. The figures in Xin-Yi’s photographs are just part of the landscape; some depict only evidence of bodies – what those bodies have built. Kit
Kittle’s Surfaces series calls into question the very nature of our skin, daring us to define our own barriers of entry. Lucy Phillips’ GI Jane wrestles with the paradox of woman’s flesh as armor and invitation, demonstrating salubrious self-realization while weaving an allegorical warning against the perils of doggedly pursuing perfection.
From mind to matter: How do we write a shared definition of the corporeal world when our experiences
of corporality are unique as, say, a fingerprint? From the flesh of a fruit (Mion’s Melons poised as gaping
mouths), to unassuming nudes observed as though by a sister or a friend (Law’s Ink), to the electric
charge of Will Cooke’s push pull abstractions (Disco Inferno), the artists in Flesh: Exercises Beyond
Erotica present their experiences as contributions to a universal definition of bodiliness. This small but
salient exhibition has a static cling that hangs around the artworks, an impression as unnerving as it is
understood.
For inquiries please contact Alexandra Porter at