Continuing our mission to review online exhibitions our users created with the Online Viewing Room in 3D, after solo shows, we move onto group shows. Our Editor chose 3 exhibitions you should see, so we recommend you visit them in the proportionally scaled digital twins we made for them.
1. Six New Voices for the Twenties
Artists: Alayna N. Pernell, Aqua Rose, Ivana Štulić, Lydia Baker, Aiza Ahmed, Jacqueline Foss
Gallery: Susan Eley Fine Art (New York City, United States)
Prices: Vary between $300 and $5.000
Available on the Online Viewing Room
The curatorial concept behind Six New Voices for the Twenties is very clear – introduce young female artists and convey their message which states that art is supposed to better the world. Susie Guzman, the curator, chose artists from various backgrounds, and while some of them explore their cultural heritage, some their connection to their surroundings, they have in common the belief that art is a tool.
It’s a double-edged sword. It can aim to heal wounds, like the series of photographs depicting African American women’s portraits held in a Black Woman’s hands do, where the caring gesture is meant to eradicate the violence and objectification they suffered in the past. Or it can create wounds by showing us scenes we did not wish to but had to see, forcing the viewer to face problems. The artists are raising awareness and addressing important issues, making their voice heard for the first time.
2. The Sixteen Trust’s Open Gallery
Artists: Lola Panco, Alison Dias, George Seurat, Josef Albers, Michaelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio, Claude Monet, Abbey Gilbert, Sandro Botticelli, Édouard Manet, Gabriella Spiegel, Ellie Kayu Ng, Aqua Rose, Bu_an, Boris, Crystal Chan, Elena Redmond, Alayna N. Pernell
Gallery: Sixteen Gallery (London, England)
Available on the Online Viewing Room
The new project of The Sixteen Trust proposes an interesting idea to both curators and artists. The plan is to create a series of shows where student works are exhibited alongside artworks from great and well known artists from across history. They hope to prove that contemporary artists are deserving of the same recognition the biggest stars got in the past, while challenging curators to think of art in continuity, to find parallels.
The main motif of the exhibition is the human body, especially the female figure that keeps coming back in different lights as the person looking at it changes. Botticelli’s Venus tries to cover herself as if she was born with pudency, while the modern woman with a pop cultural reference (Watermelon Sugar Thighs) bares her curves and dares to look down on the gazing spectator. Manet’s Olympia might have caused a fair amount of controversy with her alabaster body that seems to shine, but today we just take note of a woman claiming her own image.
3. Aus jedem Dorf ein Hund (From Every Village a Dog)
Artists: Steve Viezens, Jochen Mühlenbrink, Jan Kummer, Boehler & Ohrendt
Gallery: Thaler Originalgrafik (Leipzig, Germany)
Prices: Vary between $300 and $6.400
Available on the Online Viewing Room
While some are preoccupied with how our perception of things change, or how we can initiate those changes through art, others are focused on visuality. Before we jump to thinking that being a formalist is shallow compared to battling social issues through art, let’s take a minute to remember that we are talking about visual arts rooted in tradition.
The exhibition creates a unique contrast between past and present through combining century-old and contemporary ways of expression. Placing blocks from Tetris on classical landscapes, setting artificial wrappers against animalistic symbols reminds us of passing time and the organic changes it brings, that somehow still appears alien. There is no gap between the golden, intricate frames of baroque and the minimalist abstraction of the 21th century – we just tend to forget about the bridge connecting them when they are taken out of context.
