Other Wise

Opening Reception: Feb. 15, 2019 at 6pm – 8pm
Exhibition Dates: Feb. 15 – Mar. 09, 2019

Gallery MC
549 West 52nd Street (Between 10th and 11th Avenue)

Curated by: H Lan Thao Lam

Featuring Artists: siren eun young jung, Catalina Schliebener, Buzz Slutzky, and Trần Tín

Teresa de Lauretis, who coined the term the “queer theory” in 1991, defines it as a project of “rethink[ing] the sexual in new ways, elsewhere and otherwise.” In the almost three decades since this provocation, queer thinking, being, making and acting has evolved and proliferated across social, cultural, and political life. This show explores the intelligence of difference, of thinking and being other wise. The knowledge acquired through experiential processes, through manipulating materials and embodying research, extends beyond the initial twitch of intuition. It is a learning process perpetually gained through hardship, pain, curiosity and wonder. These featured artists manifest non-binary and non-conforming gender queerness in their materials-based approaches to drawing sculpture, and video. Hailing from East Asia to Brooklyn, their global vantage points reveal and subvert culturally and historically embedded gender norms. Reversing traditional roles in Korean opera, re-imagining the self and re-inventing childhood through the radical non-normativity of play, these works can be understood as self-fashioning, constructing new selves to be seen in all their imperfections and endless possibilities.

This exhibition has been generously supported by the Indochina Arts Partnership (IAP) and Parsons Faculty School-Based Funds.