SUBJECT TO CHANGE: ART IN THE TIME OF THE PANDEMIC
Pieta 3
Lewisham Art House
Exhibition Dates: 15 – 25 October 2021, 12 - 6 PM
‘Subject to Change’ brings together the work of seven emerging international artists responding to our ever changing political and physical environment where identities and the politics of memory are continuously renegotiated. With social and political volatility heightened, this exhibition by a group of Postgraduate alumni from Camberwell College of Arts pertinently questions the symbolic capital attached to established cultural myths, interrogates the on-going struggles in contemporary geopolitics and de-constructs the embodiment of gender and identity.
Much like the menu in the pub where the artists came up with the premise for the exhibition, all life is subject to change. This show is a reminder that nothing is set in stone – even public statues do not last forever. Power changes hands and simultaneously art provides us with the inspiration to challenge oppressive narratives. In this exhibition a multidisciplinary group of artists comes together to show a body of work that examines both the histories of art and contemporary socio-political discourses.
Pieta 1
THE PIETA SERIES
Through my ongoing effort towards unpicking prescribed gender roles and attributes from art history, classical mythology or religion, I have begun to examine the relationship between mother and son. I have begun to recognize how essential ‘unlearning’ is in regard to gender roles.
The Pieta by Michelangelo epitomizes this subject in a monumental way. The immense sculpture, carved from a single block of marble, has a particular feature that interests me. This is, that ‘Mary’ has the undeniable appearance of youth, this point has been recognized since the works conception, with Michelangelo’s suggestion that the purity of such virginal women allows them not to age.
The persistence of such unbalanced concepts about women, have trickled down through the centuries, remaining with us today. I seek to dismantle this delusion by presenting mothers who respond with disinterest – a mother who stares fixedly at a screen or drinks her wine absentmindedly. A mother in a bathroom, denotive of the passive Bonnard nudes and finally, a mythologically inspired woman who releases her justified rage.
Pieta 2
Pieta 4