Stewart Uoo
Stewart Uoo, Save It For Later, 2014. C-print. Courtesy of the artist and Galerie Buchholz. Berlin/Cologne.
Presented at the ICA are new and recent photographs, figurative sculptural works and a new carpet work, all of which revisit (and remix) elements from his exhibitions Life Is Juicy at 47 Canal (2012) and No Tears in Rain at Galerie Buchholz (2014). Like his previous work, Uoo’s new pieces examine how shifting human identities and environments mutate and interact under the pervasive influence of social media, science fiction, fashion advertising and gender politics.
The photographs—developed in collaboration with the artist Heji Shin—feature DeSe Escobar, an influential member of New York’s club, social media, art, and fashion scene, depicting her in a futuristic world that distorts and questions categories of gender, identity, class, and subjectivity. Positioned alongside these photographs, Uoo has included his darkly fetishistic mannequins, which reflect on contemporary stylisations of the self in relation to fashion trends. In his carpets, Uoo sources confessions from Cosmopolitan—an American lifestyle magazine marketed to women—to explore the narrative of the disclosure, a form that he previously explored in his film work.
Stewart Uoo, You Can Come and Get It, 2014. C-print. Courtesy Galerie Buchholz
Stewart Uoo (born 1985, California, USA. Lives and works in New York). Recent exhibitions include No Tears in Rain, Galerie Daniel Buchholz, Berlin (2014), 10th Gwangju Biennale: Burning Down the House, Gwangju, Korea (2014); It's Get Better II, Artists Space, NY, USA (2014); AIRBNB Pavilion, 14th Venice Architecture Biennale, Venice, Italy (2014); and Abandon the Parents, SMK Museum, Copenhagen, Denmark (2014).