Irony and Intimacy Intersect in Lovers in the Backseat @ FeldbuschWiesnerRudolph in Berlin

“‘Lovers in the Backseat’ refers to romantic and intimate relationships. Everything we do happens because we can't help it: Breathing, living, loving and creating art, these are our common elementary needs." (A.N. & R.S.)

The connection between the works of Robert Schittko and Anna Nero lies in the exploration of identity, playfulness and irony, as well as a slight sexiness that resonates in both artistic practices. They take the exhibition visitor on the "back seat", behind their shoulders, on the motorway, country road or overtaking lane - always on the way, but where are they actually going...? Both Nero and Schittko harbor an aversion to self-referential art. Instead, they explore the self in their studios and transform their lives into a vivid artistic practice. Each in their own way: Schittko's sculptural and photographic art focuses on the development of their own identity. Nero provokes with her abstract-representational paintings and ceramics.

Lovers in the Backseat is on view through January 6th at FeldbuschWiesnerRudolph, Jägerstraße 5, 10117 Berlin.

Vincent Ferrané Inverts the Intimate Solitude of the Bed in Embedded @ La Cité Gallery in Paris

 
 

In the series Embedded, presented by photographer Vincent Ferrané realized in collaboration with performer Pauline Lavogez, the confined space of a bed transforms into the profoundly minimalist stage of a performative expression, an "embodied experience." The project is a mosaic of images that relies on a unique space-time of experimentation, intertwining photographic and choreographic ideas much like on an editing table.

Derived from ordinary situations inherent to this intimate and universalizing playground haunted by our fantasies, fears, or passions, the created images offer enigmatic representations in seclusion: ethereal presences, bodies, and suspended faces seize hold of this original setting and transform it into a microcosm, a topography. A mattress-crater hollowed by a fist, clothes resembling geological folds, an improvised refuge beneath the sheets, and ghostly silhouettes come together to give shape to a bed-landscape.

Drawing its name from the words "bed" and "embedded," which in our media-driven age convey the idea of incorporation and embodiment, the series Embedded explores, within the perfect rectangle of the bed, the place of the body, both social and metaphorical. Between pose and pause, the series Embedded draws from the attributes of live performance to script a mosaic of black and white still images, framing the gaze on fragments of bodies, faded, trapped in the penumbra.

Vincent Ferrané
Embedded (2023)
Photograph
Courtesy of the artist

Embedded is on view November 9th through November 16th at La Cité Gallery, 71 rue Réaumur 75002, Paris.

A Supermasochistic Love Story: Read Our Intimate, Touching and Fascinating Convo With The Grande Dame of Domination Sheree Rose →

Sheree Rose is the kinky grandmother I never had but always wanted. Featured in the seminal and groundbreaking 1997 documentary SICK alongside her late partner, supermasochist Bob Flanagan, Sheree was the woman behind the curtain acting as Bob’s Domme and a massive force in helping him achieve greatness through performance, poetry, and promiscuity. All smiles and as candid as it gets, she gleefully divulged the breadth of her sexual awakening and the hardships in getting there. She is a punk, a pervert, and a pioneer — a true libertine — warm hearted yet strict and opinionated, which is why I was initially drawn to her. She is most written about in the context of Bob (“an exotic endangered species,” as she calls him), and while that relationship was undoubtedly important to her and performance history, Sheree stands alone as a remarkable and fascinating woman who waxes poetic on the state of femdom, feminist practice, and sex in the contemporary time — “out of the bedroom and into real life — explicit not just implicit.” On September 11th, we met at the ONE Archives at USC to discuss her role in the BDSM and D/s scene in Los Angeles during the 70s and 80s, the importance of choice, questions about male sexuality, and our shared love for guiding slave boys into the matriarchy. Click here to read the full interview. 

DESIGNER J.W. ANDERSON RELEASES EXCLUSIVE PRINTS BY PHOTOGRAPHER IAN DAVID BAKER

J.W. Anderson is currently hosting an exclusive, online exhibition and print sale of photographs by English photographer Ian David Baker. Baker's intimate, black-and-white portraits and collages offer a rare glimpse into gay youth subculture of 1980s England. The 50 images displayed in the exhibit have been personally curated by designer Jonathan Anderson and selected from Baker's archive. Many of the negatives no longer exist, making these original prints the last remaining copies of Baker's early work. Visit J.W. Anderson's website to view the exhibition and purchase prints.