Disembodied

About

CURATOR’S STATEMENT:

The works in Disembodied all center around a sense of absence of the body in various ways. In the case of Jillian Mayer, we see a literal disembodiment as she places her body in the interstitial space between the physical and digital realms in a video where she is shown detaching her limbs, in pursuit of the “ideal,” seeking to become the Venus di Milo. Julie Fliegenspan’s claymation gives physical form to a disembodied and at times menacing voice on the other end of the phone. In the award-winning video by 18-year old Siena Stubbs, the voice over gives a sense of removal against a moving landscape belying the pain of loss and the comfort found in human touch.

In Cara Despain’s work, Monument, the heroic figure of Hollywood’s classic Western genre loses his power and physicality, reduced to a hat, boots and spurs—nothing more than an apparition. Alexa Lim Haas’ animation, Glove, based on a true story of a glove that has been floating in space since 1965, mediates on the traces of physicality and grand ambitions humanity leaves behind. Nicole Salcedo’s Eukaryotic, captures the biorhythms of plants through sound and places them in the voice of the subject, the artist herself.

Presented in a separate gallery, Lorna Simpson’s Easy to Remember personifies the title of the exhibition, with a grid of fifteen sets of disembodied mouths humming the video’s title of John Coltrane version of a 1935 jazz song in unison, embodying acts of erasure through disembodiment.

I’m honored to have the opportunity to gather these works together by artists that have had a profound impact on me not only as a collector, but as someone developing their own artistic practice, making documentary films. As one who is behind the scenes interviewing subjects, I have deep reverence for artists who powerfully convey meaning through absence and claim space for their voice and vision. It is a privilege to bring these women artists across generations together at Locust Projects as part of a yearlong focus on women, and I thank each and every one of them for participating and inspiring me through their work.

- Dennis Scholl, guest curator, Disembodied