February 6 through July 28, 2013
OPENING RECEPTION WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 6, 6-8PM, FREE FOR ALL!
WALKTHROUGH WITH CURATOR ANTHONY ELMS (ICA MEMBERS AND DONORS ONLY), 5PM
Artists: Hilton Als; Lynda Benglis; Bernadette Corporation; Genesis Breyer P-Orridge; Dexter Sinister with Halmos; Leif Elggren; Anne-Mie Van Kerckhoven; Karen Kilimnik; Irena Knezevic; Inez van Lamsweerde & Vinoodh Matadin; Erin Leland; Zoe Leonard; Wardell Milan; Paulina Olowska; Seth Price; Rammellzee; Nick Relph; Carissa Rodriguez; Aura Rosenberg, John Miller & Frank Lutz; Nader Sadek; Frances Stark; Catherine Sullivan; Scott Treleaven; and Amy Yao.
White Petals Surround Your Yellow Heart presents the work of artists engaged with clothing, adornment, and self-presentation to highlight the inventive design, tactical implementation, or sartorial sense by which we multiply and complete our personalities. On view in ICA's First Floor Space February 6 through July, 28, 2013, this group exhibition takes inspiration from this definition by novelist JG Ballard—"Fashion: A recognition that nature has endowed us with one skin too few, and that a fully sentient being should wear its nervous system externally."
Artworks in a variety of media infuse garments with a distinctive sense of pose—the exclusive province of neither the advertisement nor the runway—to stand, statue-like, with an attitude perfumed by immense mediation and an unsteady social sphere. With examples from outlandish costumes to self-published magazines, jewelry to sculpture, performance to painting, this sensibility permeates all fields. Oscillating between branding, self-recognition, sexuality, political uniform, and economic indicator, our adornment always reflects a chosen position in and with society. Told time and time again that ours is a narcissistic age, how do we positively reveal or covertly enact desires before the mirror of our time?
This exhibition is organized by ICA Associate Curator Anthony Elms, and is accompanied by a fully illustrated catalogue.