Mannequin Death
Jarring and violent yet strangely hypnotizing, the video references the Kantian sublime landscape and the “sex appeal of the inorganic,” which, the Italian philosopher Mario Perniola argues, marks the transition from an organic, bodily sexuality to an inorganic and artificial one.
(ego hiperrealista) + (juguete del viento) =
Custic combines models, costumes and various other objects that inspire him, using them to give form to abstract concepts surrounding humanity and its evolution. Spirituality, religion, relationships and sexuality are all explored through a lens preoccupied with fragmentation, pataphysics, optical balance effects and technological art.
Untitled Door and Door Frame
Robert Gober’s work focuses around the themes of sexuality, relationships, religion, politics and nature. Working mostly in sculpture, surprisingly Gober doesn’t use found objects as a part of his work, but recreates these found objects himself and handcrafts them in his studios. Objects such as sinks, doors, cribs, chairs and body parts feature heavily in his work but yet all meticulously handmade. All the objects and installations in which Gober creates have a certain humorous element to them be it the half body that sticks out from the wall or the sink that has legs coming out of it.
Sunset Blvd
Leah Schrager is a digital artist and online performer. She is the model, photographer, artist, and marketer in/of her images. Her visual works apply a painterly aesthetic to bodily forms and often draw their material from her conceptual online practice. Her online performances are @OnaArtist (Instagram 3m) and Sarah White (The Naked Therapist). With these performances, Schrager explores themes of sexuality, representation, and distribution. Her practice is situated in a contemporary hotbed of female (in)appropriateness, arousal, celebrity, fandom, and commercialism that seeks to explore female biography and labor in today’s global society.
Infinity Selfies
Leah Schrager is a digital artist and online performer. She is the model, photographer, artist, and marketer in/of her images. Her visual works apply a painterly aesthetic to bodily forms and often draw their material from her conceptual online practice. Her online performances are @OnaArtist (Instagram 3m) and Sarah White (The Naked Therapist). With these performances, Schrager explores themes of sexuality, representation, and distribution. Her practice is situated in a contemporary hotbed of female (in)appropriateness, arousal, celebrity, fandom, and commercialism that seeks to explore female biography and labor in today’s global society.
“O impossivel”
They touch. They bite. They get warm. They penetrate. They are made. They get rid of. They stick their tongues in. They put the body in. They get body. They split up. They exist.
They want to be one. It is impossible (“O impossivel”). Which means that a single body, as you would like, is impossible. It can not. For a moment yes, for a moment they can. But no, they can’t. Impossible. They cannot be one. Despite the bites. Their bodies are different. They were born and will die self-absorbed, in themselves. Between them there is an abyss, a discontinuity. But they want to be continuous, they want their bodies to be one body. Since they cannot, they celebrate the sacrifice of the meat. “Essentially,” says Georges Bataille, “the field of eroticism is the field of violence, the field of rape.” Isn’t it violent, perhaps, to want to break the discontinuity of the other closed in on itself? Isn’t it violent to force the discontinuity of the other to be a continuous whole with him? O impossível by the Brazilian Maria Martins (1894/1973) shows the excesses of sex (take note: excess, sex). Or impossível is the moment in which the organs swell with blood and gush sexuality. The moment when animality makes us gloriously human.
ILANIO REUBIN AND ELENA SLIVNYAK
SUPREME BEINGS FASHION SHOW
The Supreme Beings Fashion Show will reveal the avant-garde concepts of two local fashion designers, Ilanio Reubin of Ilanio and Elena Slivnyak of IIMUAHII, at the spacious SOMArts Cultural Center on Thursday, March 1st. The two runway shows will showcase 8 imaginative looks from each designer, as well as two short improvisational performances by Butoh (contemporary Japanese) dancers which we find very fitting for the two creatives.Though different in aesthetic, both designers hail from similar backgrounds and aim for analogous goals. Ilanio (San Francisco Art Institute) and Elena (Academy of Art) both found the retail and fashion corporate worlds too constrictive and mass-produced, and thus ventured into their own imaginative ones.
Ilanio works to create “visually stunning fashion concepts that explicitly disregard wearability, saleability, and practicality; that embrace advanced definitions of sexuality and gender; and that defy the commercially-mandated boundary between the fashion and art worlds.” For Elena of IIMUAHIII, her avant-garde aesthetic is manifested in an intricately-crafted sportswear line.Although we’re dreaming of being in Paris (but really, when are we not?), we’re excited to watch Ilanio and IIMUAHII strut and represent San Francisco’s undeniable talent in their nontraditional fashion show and hope to see you all there as well!