We call it a good day when we learn about one new female artist toying with art and gender in radical new ways. Thanks to Judith Charles Gallery’s exhibition “Immediate Female,” we’re ogling the nuanced and gutsy works of no less than 10. The lady-centric exhibition thrives off the energy of this particular moment of feminist momentum that will never be the same again. The artists on view, varying in medium, style and perspective (though all are based in New York), tackle the challenge of making art as a woman today with a diverse array of techniques and flavors.
Dana Sherwood
- Making Sausage, 2014, Ink and watercolor on paper, 7 x 10 in
Dana Sherwood’s ink and watercolored “Making Sausage” resembles a 1950s greeting card gone haywire. A domestic Cinderella type dutifully ties her sausage casings into place, though the unwieldy intestines and splattered blood seem more like the stuff of a horror movie still than a Good Housekeeping illustration. Genesis Belanger’s mixed media sculpture “There Is No Queen In This Hive” features long, lean fingers stacked and cinched like a bunch of bananas. The cluster hangs from a wired cage, reminiscent of a surrealist cosmetics display and perhaps a torture chamber.
Heidi Hahn
- The Name I Call Myself Belongs to You, 2014, Oil on Canvas, 16 x 20 in
Heidi Hahn’s “The Name I Call Myself Belongs to You,” toys with the history of modernist painting, specifically of the female nude or odalisque, capturing an asexual, hairless figure staring boldly at the viewer. Her body appears like a blank canvas, a living space for the viewer to project his or her fantasy, whatever it may be. And Amanda Pohan traps and bottles body sprays labeled as “Orgasmic Exhalations,” made from time, breath, rosemary and myrrh.
Amanda Pohan
- Orgasmic Exhalations,001– 013, 2014, Body spray, Dimensions vary
Genesis Belanger
- There Is No Queen In This Hive, 2014, 35 x 10 x 8, Steel, ceramic, rope
Irina Arnaut
- Heidi, June 1961, 2014, Vintage Playboy, light collage, c-print, 20 x 16 in
Irini Miga
- When the by the Balcony likes the by the Kitchen, 2014, Metal, wood, bricks, duck tape, ceramic, felt, acrylic paint, drywall, 82 x 38 x 27 in
Itziar Barrio
- I’m A Writer, 2014, Silkscreen on latex, 79 x 19 in
Katya Grokhovsky
- Blue Wrap, Performance for video, 2013, 1:08, ed 2/5
Nikki Maloof
- Lonely Monkey, 2014, Oil on canvas, 17 x 20 in
Justine Hill
- There’s More Than One of Everything II, 2015, Acrylic & Pastel on Canvas, 112 x 94 in
