Olga Korper Gallery is pleased to present The Formless Body, curated by Jarrett Earnest. The exhibition invites artists, poets, scholars, and archivists to reflect on the process and materiality of archival work, and their dedication to the stories that archives enable. The focus was on the artistic, intellectual, emotional and spiritual labor itself, attending to the complex problems of queer life in the wake of the AIDS crisis.
The exhibition is the result of an invitation from artist Christine Davis to edit an issue of the journal she co-founded in 1986, PUBLIC: Art/Culture/Ideas. PUBLIC 65—DEVOTION: Today’s Archive is Tomorrow’s Future (2022), simultaneously published as a hardcover book, brings together art, ephemera, scholarship and recollections around the particular practices of queer archival work.
To mark this publication, the exhibition The Formless Body extends those accounts into space, showing important and rarely exhibited artworks by Ching Ho Ching (1946-1989), Darrel Ellis (1958-1992), Robert Flack (1957-2003) Âhasiw Maskêgon-Iskwêw, (1958-2006) along with work by other artists who engage these lineages, like Adrian Stimson’s 2012 re-enactment of Âhasiw Maskêgon-Iskwêw 1992 performance White Shame, and Matthew Leifheit’s photographs of the relics and sites of queer history. The exhibition includes new and historical paintings, sculpture, photographs and time-based media, equally pairing Canadians with artists from the US. The subject of the exhibition is not just the body but the spirit, the presence of the dead, and the transcendence of death, through form.
An attention to the historical importance of ephemera is furthered by a newly created suite of artist’s postcards, funded by Partners In Art, which extend the publication and exhibition beyond their own boundaries, allowing them to proliferate these stories into the world and future archives.
ARTISTS:
Stephen Andrews, Ching Ho Cheng, Alexandra Chowaniec, Christine Davis, Kalale Dalton-Lutale, Darrel Ellis, Robert Flack, Josh T. Franco, Christy Gast, Leonie Guyer, Simone Kearney, Matthew Leifheit, Ian Lewandowski, Âhasiw Maskêgon-Iskwêw, Jamie Ross, Cason Sharpe, Linda Simpson, Adrian Stimson, Tim Whiten
CURATOR
Jarrett Earnest is a New York based curator and critic. He is the author of What it Means to Write About Art: Interviews with Art Critics (2018) and editor of Hot,Cold, Heavy. Light: 100 Art Writings 1988-2017 by Peter Schjeldahl (2019) and has contributed to many publications and museum catalogs around the world. He has curated several archivally based exhibitions: “The Young and Evil: Queer Modernism in New York 1930-1955” (2018) and “WHAT A DUMP” (2021) which focuses on Ray Johnson and the role of collage and kink subculture in later twentieth century queer art —both at David Zwirner gallery New York. Most recently he curated “Ways of Seeing: Three Takes on the Jack Shear Drawing Collection,” currently on view at the Drawing Centre in New York.
ARTISTS
Stephen Andrews is a Canadian artist whose work deals with memory, identity, technology and their representations in various media including photography, drawing, animation, painting and ceramics. He has exhibited internationally and is represented by Paul Petro Gallery in Toronto.
Christy Gast is an artist whose work across media stems from extensive research and site visits to places she thinks of as “contested landscapes.” She is based in New York.
Matthew Leifheit is a Brooklyn based photographer, writer and magazine editor. He is the founder of MATTE Magazine.
Darrel Ellis (1958–1992) was an artist whose multidisciplinary process melds photography, the history of painting, and family histories. His estate is represented by Candace Madey in New York.
Christine Davis is a New York and Toronto based artist whose work encompasses a wide variety of formal techniques to investigate language, time, and wonder.
Ching Ho Cheng (1946–1989) was an artist whose paintings span intense psychedelic landscapes to tranquil domestic interior scenes. His estate is managed by his sister, Sybao Cheng-Wilson.
Jamie Ross is a visual artist, a city gardener, and educator. Their films have been exhibited throughout Canada and internationally.
Cason Sharpe is a writer currently based in Toronto. His first collection of stories, Our Lady of Perpetual Realness, was released by Metatron Press in 2017.
Ian Lewandowski is a photographer based in Brooklyn, NY whose work has been featured in The New York Times and Gay letter. His first monograph, The Ice Palace is Gone (2021) is published by Magic Hour Press.
Linda Simpson has been a staple in the New York City drag scene since the late 1980’s. She was the founder and editor of My Comrade (1986–1995), and her collection of photography The Drag Explosion (2020) is published by Domain Books.
Simone Kearney is a New York based artist and writer. Her work has been exhibited internationally and her most recent book, Days (2021) is published by Belladonna*.
Alexandra Chowaniec is Canadian artist based in Brooklyn, NY and Co Founder of Chowaniec Projects, which visualizes climate action through art.
Leonie Guyer is an artist who lives and works in San Francisco, CA. Her work has been shown internationally and is characterized by idiosyncratic shapes that are deployed in a variety of spaces.
Adrian Stimson is a member of the Siksika (Blackfoot) Nation in southern Alberta, Canada. He is an interdisciplinary artist and exhibits nationally and internationally.
Robert Flack (1957–1993) was an artist based in Toronto. His work explored the confluence of inner psychic and bodily realms. His estate is represented by Paul Petro Gallery in Toronto.
Âhasiw Maskêgon-Iskwêw (1958–2006) was a Cree and French Métis artist, writer, and curator. His work explored new media art within the context of indigenous communities in Canada.
Tim Whiten is an artist whose work seeks to navigate the territory of the human condition with the intent of inviting experiences and encouraging “sensing” over “reading”. Whiten’s work extends from two- to three-dimensional forms and includes ritual performances, real-time systems, site-specific and mixed media installations.
