Skin Stealers

Los Angeles

Isabelle Albuquerque / Mattia Biagi / Dominique Fung / Georgina Gratrix / Keith Haring / Devin B. Johnson / Philipp Kremer / Hugo Wilson / Robert Yarber / curated by Ben Lee Ritchie Handler

October 26 – December 7, 2019

Isabelle Albuquerque Orgy For 10 People In One Body Leda and the Swan 2019 Bronze Sculpture Nicodim Gallery Los Angeles

Isabelle Albuquerque
Orgy For 10 People In One Body, 2019
cast bronze and saxophone
42 x 40 x 80 in
107 x 102 x 203 cm
Ed. 1 of 3 + AP

 

Mattia Biagi Bela 2019 Sculpture Nicodim Gallery Los Angeles Cat Roomba

Mattia Biagi
Bela, 2019
robotic vacuum cleaner, stuffed animal, spray paint
26 x 14 x 14 in
66 x 35.5 x 35.5 cm

charging station:
31 x 22 x 5 in
79 x 56 x 13 cm

 

Mattia Biagi Lugosi 2019 Sculpture Nicodim Gallery Los Angeles Cat Roomba

Mattia Biagi
Lugosi, 2019
robotic vacuum cleaner, stuffed animal, spray paint
24 x 14 x 14 in
61 x 35.5 x 35.5 cm

charging station:
31 x 22 x 5 in
79 x 56 x 13 cm

 

Dominique Fung Jokes/Compliments 2019 Painting Nicodim Gallery Los Angeles

Dominique Fung
Jokes/Compliments, 2019
oil on canvas
60 x 72 in
152 x 183 cm
 

 

Dominique Fung Matrilineality 2019 Painting Nicodim Gallery Los Angeles

Dominique Fung
Matrilineality, 2019
oil on canvas
60 x 72 in
152 x 183 cm

Georgina Gratrix Pre Nap Face (Portrait of the Artist) 2019 Painting Nicodim Gallery Los Angeles

Georgina Gratrix
Pre Nap Face (Portrait of the Artist), 2019
oil on canvas
24 x 18 in
60 x 45 cm

 

Georgina Gratrix Mr Magugu 2019 Painting Nicodim Gallery Los Angeles

Georgina Gratrix
Mr Magugu, 2019
oil on canvas
28 x 22 in
70 x 55 cm

 

Georgina Gratrix The King of Hollywood 2019 Painting Nicodim Gallery Los Angeles

Georgina Gratrix
The King of Hollywood, 2019
oil on canvas
47 x 35 in
120 x 90 cm

Georgina Gratrix Love Goddess 2019 Painting Nicodim Gallery Los Angeles

Georgina Gratrix
Love Goddess, 2019
oil on canvas
47 x 35 in
120 x 90 cm

Keith Haring Untitled Painting Nicodim Gallery 1983 Los Angeles

Keith Haring
Untitled, 1983
vinyl paint on vinyl tarpaulin with metal grommets
120 x 120 in
305 x 305 cm
 

Keith Haring Untitled signed 1983 Painting Nicodim Gallery Los Angeles

Keith Haring
Untitled signed, inscribed, titled and dated 'K. Haring MAR.7-83 TOKYO ' (on the
reverse), 1983
Sumi ink on paper
31 x 43 in
79 x 110 cm

 

Devin Johnson Hush Now 2019 Painting Nicodim Gallery Los Angeles

Devin B. Johnson
Hush Now..., 2019
oil, oil stick, and spray paint on canvas
80 x 70 in
203 x 178 cm

Devin Johnson Mama Said 2019 Painting Nicodim Gallery Los Angeles

Devin B. Johnson
Mama Said..., 2019
oil, oil stick, and spray paint on canvas
80 x 70 in
203 x 178 cm

Philipp Kremer Couple (II-II) 2018 Painting Nicodim Gallery Los Angeles

Philipp Kremer
Couple (II-II), 2018
oil on canvas
79 x 110 in
200 x 280 cm
 

Philipp Kremer Gathering (XV) 2018 Painting Nicodim Gallery Los Angeles

Philipp Kremer
Gathering (XV), 2018
oil on canvas
79 x 110 in
200 x 280 cm

Hugo Wilson Safe Cracker 2019 Painting Nicodim Gallery Los Angeles

Hugo Wilson
Safe Cracker, 2019
oil on aluminum
59 x 68 in
150 x 173 cm

Robert Yarber Woman With Binoculars 2019 Painting Nicodim Gallery Los Angeles

Robert Yarber
Woman with Binoculars, 2019
acrylic on canvas
68 x 95 in
173 x 242 cm
 

Press Release

Curated by Ben Lee Ritchie Handler

 

A sudden blow: the great wings beating still
Above the staggering girl, her thighs caressed
By the dark webs, her nape caught in his bill,
He holds her helpless breast upon his breast.

How can those terrified vague fingers push
The feathered glory from her loosening thighs?
And how can body, laid in that white rush,
But feel the strange heart beating where it lies?

A shudder in the loins engenders there
The broken wall, the burning roof and tower
And Agamemnon dead.
                    Being so caught up,
So mastered by the brute blood of the air,
Did she put on his knowledge with his power
Before the indifferent beak could let her drop?

— “Leda and the Swan,” William Butler Yeats, 1923

SKIN STEALERS is an exhibition of figurative artists who inhabit the bodies of others, documenting, bearing witness to, and forcing themselves into their subjects’ more intimate and occasionally dangerous behaviors. The exhibition emerges from the respective wombs of two large paintings: Keith Haring’s massive, pregnant female form, and Hugo Wilson’s Boschian (or perhaps Rube Goldbergian) machination of an organic, sexless conception and birth. Isabelle Albuquerque casts her own skin in bronze in the role of Leda from “Leda and the Swan”—in her telling, Zeus assumes the shape of a violating saxophone—while Dominique Fung’s similarly headless, nude figure grasps, strangles, and beheads a bevy of ill-intentioned fowl. Devin B. Johnson inhabits the body of a mother turning a blind-eye to her chubby, sock and diaper-clad child as he wanders into Philipp Kremer’s orgy of primary and secondary colors, and Georgina Gratrix’s textured, playfully layered portraits look-on in amusement. Mattia Biagi’s animated black cats scurry throughout the proceedings, simultaneously picking up scraps with the roombas that carry them and altering the luck of all who enter. Watching it all from a safe distance is Robert Yarber’s naughty voyeur, emerging from her black underpainting with a cocktail and a pair of binoculars.

Apart from Keith Haring’s pieces, all works are 2018–2019 and created specifically for SKIN STEALERS.