Above Second is proud to present a group exhibition featuring the original works of six talented artists: Emily Burns, Yumiko Kayukawa, Francesco Pogliaghi, Crajes, Sonya Fu, and Ray Caesar.
How are women portrayed in contemporary art? Is it all about seduction? The voyeuristic? Can women be powerful and independent even when subject to the Gaze? The psychological effect of the gaze as described by Jacques Lacan is that the subject looses a degree of autonomy upon realizing she is a visual object. In her 1975 essay “Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema,” Laura Mulvey uses Lacan’s concept of the gaze to analyze the objectification of women in film, and thus by extension visual art. Mulvey’s feminist theory questions the objectification of women in art. But today, with women and men supposedly equals in society, perhaps this objectification can be subverted.
In this group exhibition, all of the subjects are so much more than just “pretty girls.” The artists bring together a multifaceted view of women in contemporary society, showing the diversity of the female form, personalities, desires, and fantasies.
Each artist brings a unique vision and aesthetic to the show. Emily Burns investigates the inner complexities of women through intimate glimpses of parallel environments. By exposing themselves intentionally, her women explore the vulnerability of beauty. Yumiko Kayukawa explores the relationship of women and nature, thus exposing the natural power of her subjects. Her women are strong in the presence of tigers, snakes, and demon –communal with nature. In Francesco Pogliaghi’s pieces, the female form is juxtaposed with urban environments and recycled materials exploring the subject’s stories through the relationship of the form and environment. The female form is obscured and absorbed into the backgrounds, obliterating identity. Duo Carla Rendón and Jessica Ruiz, working together under the name Crajes, mix horror-movie grotesqueness with traditionally feminine elements to explore the darker side of the female psyche. Their work explores death, religion, and fantasy in relationship to female empowerment and sexuality. Local artist, Sonya Fu illustrates dreams. She digitally paints women in surrealist backgrounds exposing their desires and fantasies, but leaving the interpretation up to the audience. She hopes her characters will cause the viewer to pause and reexamine their perspective on life and everyday encounters. Finally, Ray Caesar, a star of the international low brow scene, uses his art to express trauma. His seductive, powerful, and distorted women are eroticized while at the same time asexual. He is concerned with the multifaceted personalities of a person, drawing from his own experience suffering from Dissociative Identity Disorder.
Meeting together from around the world, and working in disparate styles and mediums, these artists converge through their exploration of the intricacies of female sexuality, beauty, and the gaze.
Image: © Emily Burns, Above Second
