Alison Jacques presents a two-person exhibition pairing, for the first time, internationally renowned artists Linder (b.1954, Liverpool, UK) with Hannah Wilke (b.1940, New York; d.1993, Houston, US). The exhibition runs concurrent to Linder’s solo exhibition ‘A Dream Between Sleeping and Waking’ ongoing at Charleston, UK (until 12 March 2023), and follows ‘Hannah Wilke: Art for Life’s Sake’, Wilke’s major survey at the Pulitzer Arts Foundation, St. Louis, Missouri, US (2021–22).
Both artists are recognised as pioneers, provocateurs and radical feminists with work spanning photography, performance, photomontage, and in Wilke’s case, sculpture and drawing. Raising shared questions in their individual practices around gender, the portrayal of women’s sexuality against domesticity, and the commodification of the body, both Linder and Wilke openly criticise the conventional female roles and representation specific to each of their generations.
For Linder, this exhibition focuses on photomontages from 2007 to the present, in which she explores the possibilities for subverting the deeply encoded narratives sold through pornographic magazines of the 1970s–80s. Through a lens of humour and the surreal, Linder juxtaposes images of furniture, domestic appliances, shells, cakes, flowers and in particular, the rose, mimicking the absurdity of gendered consumerism. ‘I like to see how far I can ramp up desire within one image until it becomes grotesquely comic…’
For Wilke some of the works here focus on her subversion of consumer fantasies developed through the commercial advertising of the time. Wilke employed her naked body, often in provocative poses, so she could become, ‘…representative of every woman.’
Lead image: Linder, Enantiodromia, 2008 © Linder; Hannah Wilke, Atrophy, 1978-84 © Marsie, Emanuelle, Damon and Andrew Scharlatt, Hannah Wilke Collection & Archive, Los Angeles
| Duration | 02 February 2023 - 11 March 2023 |
| Times | Tuesday – Saturday 11am – 6pm |
| Cost | Free |
| Venue | Alison Jacques Gallery |
| Address | 22 Cork Street, London, W1S 3NG |
| Contact | 4402076314720 / info@alisonjacquesgallery.com / www.alisonjacquesgallery.com |