ARTILLERY BEST IN SHOW 2017

Moving well past a theme dominant in recent contemporary fine (and popular) art, Friedman’s brilliantly curated (and gorgeous) show of painting saw us through to a deeper, more complex and nuanced—and richly generative—consideration of identity in the 21st century

What are the contours of gender? Is there a range of conditions that determine gender along a curve or spectrum we can visualize or somehow represent, measure or analyze? Is there a focal point we can identify that will turn it in one direction or another?

Engender, a group exhibition curated by Joshua Friedman at Michael Kohn Gallery, represents an amalgam of familiar visual tropes, albeit shattered ones. Ideas about identity, sexuality and personal choice are brought to the fore in this stunning line up that includes the likes of Nicole Eisenman, Hernan Bas, Jansson Stegner and many others.

The construct of what makes us male and female is perhaps one of the most obdurate that we as a society face. More often than not, in our need to make comfortable our understanding of things not simply defined, we seek to classify in extremes, simplifying what should be a delightful spectrum into simplistic, unthreatening terms of black and white.

Before Kohn had fully installed its exhibition of paintings that address the fluidity of gender, collectors had already bought 70% of its contents. Of the 17 artists in the show, buyers came hungry for the names Loie Hollowell, Jesse Mockrin, Tschabalala Self, Jansson Stegner, Emily Mae Smith and Christina Quarles.

As Hollywood continues to reckon with widespread allegations of sexual assault and toxic masculinity, L.A.’s art scene has offered some solace in the form of the binary-smashing exhibit “Engender.” The show, which opened at Kohn Gallery this weekend, attracted a tide of progressive arts patrons, including actress and survivor Rose McGowan, who is currently leading the charge against Harvey Weinstein and gendered power dynamics in the industry.

“Engender” is a group exhibition featuring seventeen contemporary artists who are revolutionizing the way one visualizes conventional gender as exclusively male or female. Through painting, a medium that has traditionally embraced this binary, these artists are pushing the genre in new, unprecedented directions, challenging the ways in which paintings can be used to deconstruct and rewrite conventional notions of personal identity.

“Engender” opened this week at Kohn Gallery in Los Angeles. The group show is curated by Joshua Friedman, and investigates the way gender is explored in painting by 17 contemporary artists. The medium has traditionally approached male and female as a binary. Today, that’s being challenged by artists like Hernan Bas, Natalie Frank, Nathaniel Mary Quinn, Nicole Eisenman, and more. Whitewallspoke with Friedman about the exhibition, on view through January 13, 2018.

“Engender,” at Kohn Gallery. A new group show looks at the ways in which 17 contemporary artists are approaching the topic of gender through painting, picking apart the idea of the binary in ways that are figurative, expressive and abstract. This includes works by figures such as Hernan Bas, Tschabalala Self, Mequitta Ahuja and Nathaniel Mary Quinn.

The 17 painters included in “Engender,” a show at Los Angeles’s Kohn Gallery, aim to tackle these questions. The artists, ranging from well-known figures like Nicole Eisenmanand Hernan Bas to rising stars like Firelei Báez and Tschabalala Self, contribute to a conversation about how to expand and deconstruct the visual language of gender identity.

Kohn Gallery in Los Angeles recently announced their upcoming Fall exhibition, Engender, focusing on male and female gender classifications. Through works by seventeen contemporary artists the show will examine this timely topic attempting to revolutionizing the way we visualize conventional gender as exclusively male or female.