ART
Desire in Syracuse: the 'Come On' Controversy
/ Yvonne Olivas
11.07.07
Desire in Syracuse
I
It was the flyer for "Come On: Desire Under the Female Gaze" that initially caught my attention with its cropped image of I'll Be Your Mirror by Juliet Jacobson and matching seductive title in its glam-metal, fleshy-pink font. In Jacobson's drawing, one half of the graphite image mirrors the other—making it appear that a nude boy with eyes closed reclines and melds into the body of his perfect twin. A giant heart-shape hangs like a moon above the languid pair while skulls and peacock feathers make do as a bed beneath. The name of the exhibition is printed below the image and alludes to Jo-Anne Balcaen's Aw, C'mon while the '80s-rock font suggests Rachel Rampleman's Poison: My Sister Fucked Bret video. My interest piqued, I tracked down the show's curator, Astria Suparak, and the show's three artists for interviews.
The exhibition opened in late August in Syracuse, New York at the Warehouse Gallery. Affiliated with Syracuse University as one of a consortium of school galleries (Coalition of Museums and Art Centers—CMAC), the space maintains relative independence with its off-campus, downtown location. This location allowed The Warehouse to better fulfill its purported aim to act as a bridge between the university and the population of Syracuse while presenting international contemporary engaged art, but more specifically by stimulating dialog about art's role in society and expanding notions of art with exposure to current art practice.
Of course, "Come On" did just that with three young women artists taking on desire and sexuality and brought together by a curator who openly describes herself as a "young, queer woman of color." And whether at first by choice and later by dint of circumstance, the ongoing theme of the exhibition was the personal laid bare and exposed. Alternately sexy and uncomfortable the show was always HOT. And not just because of the artwork. Browsing online I found that the exhibition had already been extensively covered by the press; curiously, the curator was fired just after the show opened. It was not too long until speculations about censorship over the content of the exhibition were circulating online. Hot indeed! And presumably no accident either.
I
It was the flyer for "Come On: Desire Under the Female Gaze" that initially caught my attention with its cropped image of I'll Be Your Mirror by Juliet Jacobson and matching seductive title in its glam-metal, fleshy-pink font. In Jacobson's drawing, one half of the graphite image mirrors the other—making it appear that a nude boy with eyes closed reclines and melds into the body of his perfect twin. A giant heart-shape hangs like a moon above the languid pair while skulls and peacock feathers make do as a bed beneath. The name of the exhibition is printed below the image and alludes to Jo-Anne Balcaen's Aw, C'mon while the '80s-rock font suggests Rachel Rampleman's Poison: My Sister Fucked Bret video. My interest piqued, I tracked down the show's curator, Astria Suparak, and the show's three artists for interviews.
The exhibition opened in late August in Syracuse, New York at the Warehouse Gallery. Affiliated with Syracuse University as one of a consortium of school galleries (Coalition of Museums and Art Centers—CMAC), the space maintains relative independence with its off-campus, downtown location. This location allowed The Warehouse to better fulfill its purported aim to act as a bridge between the university and the population of Syracuse while presenting international contemporary engaged art, but more specifically by stimulating dialog about art's role in society and expanding notions of art with exposure to current art practice.
Of course, "Come On" did just that with three young women artists taking on desire and sexuality and brought together by a curator who openly describes herself as a "young, queer woman of color." And whether at first by choice and later by dint of circumstance, the ongoing theme of the exhibition was the personal laid bare and exposed. Alternately sexy and uncomfortable the show was always HOT. And not just because of the artwork. Browsing online I found that the exhibition had already been extensively covered by the press; curiously, the curator was fired just after the show opened. It was not too long until speculations about censorship over the content of the exhibition were circulating online. Hot indeed! And presumably no accident either.