I’m excited to announce that I am currently curating my first group show, ‘Flash Figures: Celebrating the Figure on Paper’, opening on Thursday 20th February at The RW Project, in Ruzafa, Valencia.
Curating a show had been one of my art goals for 2020. I’ve been writing in quite a considered manner about the art I encounter for a while, and I’m excited to take this thinking forward, into the realm of curating. I have to admit I wasn’t expecting the opportunity to present itself quite so quickly, but it has! In conversation with the wonderful Gracie who is developing an exciting events space in Ruzafa and Emma Shapiro , fellow artist and co-creator of The Body Room, the idea to put on a show rooted in life studies and the human figure emerged. This conversation happened on Monday 10th February… and the show is opening just 10 days later, on the 20th Feb!
We rapidly decided to curate the show together, as ‘Shapiro & Brown’, and under the title of “Flash Figures”. As a) we’re putting it on bloody quick, b) a bit of alliteration never hurt anyone and c) a little light word play on ‘flashing’ and nudity. The tag line of ‘Celebrating the Figure on Paper’ emerged as we started to set parameters for our Call for Works. All works must be on paper (to keep hanging simple), framed or unframed (to make life easy for our contributing artists) and responding to the human figure.
As we have engaged our network of local artists, I have become more and excited by the theme of the show. It seems deceptively simple – lifedrawing has long been a staple of art education, the nude is endemic in art history. Really, what more is there to add?
But as we put together this show, it feels fresh, vital and alive. We are drawing on an amazing body of artists who are resident or connected with the Valencia art community. From self-taught artists to artists who have studied at some of the most prestigious art schools worldwide. These include painters, graphic artists, sculptors, VR artists and more. And for some reason this diverse body of artists still respond to the human figure in their creative practice today.
For me personally, I am fascinated by what this work says about how we consider the human figure today. In a society that on one hand seems increasingly puritanical with its censorship of the naked or nude human figure, yet at the same time offers an abyss of pornographic images, what does it mean to respond to the human figure today? What meaning does being naked or nude take on in society today? How can we celebrate the figure on paper, as artists today?
OPEN CALL
Would you like to submit your works for the show?
Please complete this simple submission form
NOTE: we are accepting photographic works and abstract works that derive from the human figure.