CAVERNOUS (Young Joon Kwak & Living Queer Archive)
*Installation views include Young Joon Kwak’s “Living Queer Archive,” including works by laub, Johanna Went, unclassified objects from the ONE National Gay & Lesbian Archives, and wigs styled by Rosario Ribera from “Hollywood Wigs.”
**Link to work by Mutant Salon in CAVERNOUS
CAVERNOUS: Young Joon Kwak & Mutant Salon
Curated by Daniela Lieja Quintanar
Exhibition Dates: July 12-August 26, 2018
all photos by Christopher Wormald unless otherwise stated.
LACE’s Summer Residency presents CAVERNOUS by artist Young Joon Kwak and Mutant Salon, a collective of queer-trans-femme-POC artists and performers and a platform for community collaborations. CAVERNOUS is a kaleidoscopic environment that queers the last bastion of manhood in the domestic space—the man cave. CAVERNOUS fractures the patriarchal myth of male privilege, and provides an access point for an ongoing critical deconstruction of how we view our bodies, and reimagines alternative forms of existence and desire.
Welcoming viewers at the entrance of CAVERNOUS, Young Joon Kwak presents new sculptures and a living queer archive that reclaims erased narratives and traces a lineage of radical present-future queer arts communities in Los Angeles. Kwak’s archive features a selection of unclassified objects by unknown artists from the ONE National Gay & Lesbian Archives, as well as custom wigs by stylists from historic Hollywood retailers displayed on ceramic wig stands designed by Kwak as a tribute to the artistry of these under-recognized wig stylists. The archive also includes a screening of video works and documentation by historically radical local performance artist Johanna Went, connecting the community of Mutant Salon with LACE’s 40 year history of supporting queer and feminist performance art.
http://welcometolace.org/event/young-joon-kwak-mutant-salon-cavernous-lace-summer-residency/
Preferred Pronouns
2018
300” x 15”
LED neon sign on the marquee of Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions (LACE). Permanent public artwork viewable on Hollywood Blvd’s Walk of Fame.
Ceiling Vaginis Light Drip
2018
LED neon rope, paint.
CAVERNOUS (installation view)
including (from left to right): “Vaginis Wig Head II” by Young Joon Kwak; unknown objects from the ONE Archives; “Vaginis Chair,” “Ceiling Vaginis Light Drip,” and “Surveillance Mirror Vaginis” by Young Joon Kwak; “The King Chair,” by laub; video by Joanna Went; and sculpture by Jacinto Astiazaran
Vaginis Chair, 2018, wood, resin, velvet, foam, ceramic basin, cold-cast aluminum, soil, rocks, paint. 40 3/4" x 29 1/2" x 45 1/4"
Inverted Vaginis Masturbators V,VI, VII, 2018, Cast resin, silver leaf, Dimensions variable
Vaginis Lamp, 2017-2018, Hydrocal, resin, light cord, light bulb, 28 1/4" x 11 1/2" x 9"
Surveillance Mirror Vaginis
2018
Convex acrylic security mirror, fiberglass resin, wood, silver leaf
79 1/4" x 48 1/2" x 8 1/2"
Hermaphroditus’s Reveal III
2018
Fiberglass resin, cast resin, pigmented epoxy clay, acrylic paint, silver leaf
52 1/2" x 28" x 43"
Vaginis Head Wig II – IV
2018
Ceramic, paint, custom-made wigs by Rosario Ribera
unclassified objects by unknown artists from the ONE National Gay & Lesbian Archives
1. Artist Unknown, Untitled (Phallic object), Unknown date, Fiber glass resin.
2. Artist Unknown, Untitled (dancing penis/vagina), 1977, Bronze on marble stone.
3. Artist Unknown, Untitled (Phallic teapot), Unknown Date, Ceramic.
4. Artist(s) Unknown, Untitled (4 Phallic Objects), Carved stone, Unknown Date.
All Courtesy of the ONE National Gay & Lesbian Archives