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EVENT DESCRIPTION
Novalis Art Design is pleased to present “Sex Be With You,” a group show curated by Charmaine Tam featuring artists Batten and Kamp, IV Chan, Florence Lam, and Lau Hong Lam. Sex is everywhere. We are surrounded by sex, especially in this modern consumerist age, where sex or the promise of it has been used to sell products through a near constant bombardment of imagery. The ready availability of online porn and other digital media has made the rampant consumption of sex possible. The proliferation of sexualisation in mainstream media has made it less taboo. Sex out of marriage is no longer frowned upon, we are urged to celebrate our own sexuality. This is indeed a thing to be celebrated! And yet, with sex becoming commonplace, it seems to have led to an increase in the mindless consumption of it. More and more people are increasingly blind to the power of sex, that in any act of sex, power is being exerted on, or being taken away from someone or something. Sex and power are inherently intertwined with each other. This exhibition is an invitation to both the audience and the artists to re-examine this relationship between sex and power that permeates our society.
Lau Hong Lam’s mezzotint series The Bee and The Butterfly explores the power dynamics in relationships based on the attachment styles of intimacy. The six prints interpret the fluidity of power and madness of obsession within intimacy. The work revolves around two Greek mythological deities of love and sexuality, Eros and Anteros, who represent the expression of love and the response of love respectively. Those who are struck by Eros’ golden arrow sink into unrequited love for others (or one might say a lustful obsession), while those who are struck by Anteros’ arrow respond to the love of others. Eros and Anteros are often portrayed as opposites, but at the same time they cannot exist alone. Eros and Anteros are mirrors that complement and complete each other, just as in an intimate relationship, love needs to be an even match, not a one-way projection or exertion of power. Pure love is a completely sensual thing, it is the desire for sex. We are wounded by the golden arrow of Eros, we fall in love with total insanity and sweet honey-like fantasies, and at the same time we yearn for the reciprocation of love or sex.
In The Good, the Bed and the Snuggly, IV Chan creates a mise-en-scène of sex for the viewer to interpret and activate in their mind with their own fantasy. As we approach, we are first greeted by the broken, unhinged bed rail flung at us by the two figures who are so engrossed in violent sex, they have broken the baby bed. The setting of the baby bed already lends a sense of taboo to the sexual act in question. IV Chan deliberately leaves the identities of the purple and green figures open to interpretation, either of them could be male, female, genderless, or even nonhuman. The roles of the figures are also not specified and could be engaged in taboos such as incest. The only thing that is clear is that they are engaged in all-consuming sex: green wrapping purple in an engulfing embrace, purple pushing against green to the point where they both ooze out of the baby bed, entrails and/or sexual organs flailing. As if within the sexual act they are so ravenous to join with the other, that it is not enough, and they spill over to encroach upon their surroundings. Stickers stuck throughout the baby bed with phrases like ‘Suck My Toe,’ ‘Cry Louder,’ and ‘Fresh Milk’ which start off as phrases associated with baby behaviour now take on a layer of sexual meaning, reinforcing the taboo. Through these explorations, The Good, the Bed and the Snuggly highlights sex and power in various ways: the surrendering of the self as a surrender of power in sex, transgressing the taboo in sex as an enactment of power, the setting of what is taboo itself a reflection of the power exercised on the individual by society, and the power involved in sex and fertility.
The relation between the power dynamics in sex and female fertility is foregrounded in Florence Lam’s Chicken, Pork, Beef and Fish. This series of four videos in which Florence performs ‘table-top action poetry’ was inspired by feminist-vegetarian author Carol J. Adams’ The Sexual Politics of Meat, which explores the relationship between meat eating and patriarchal power. Florence highlights the systematic exploitation of female fertility with these works, each ‘menu item’ fraught with symbols and actions that recall female fertility in a familiar but uncanny manner. All four videos feature Florence performing a series of actions on a traditional white tablecloth setting which directly references the act of eating and recalls Adams’ parallel drawn between meat eating and patriarchal power. Florence involves her own body in all four ‘tabletop action poetries.’ The actions stem from her own experience of male/female power dynamics and female fertility through the lens of The Sexual Politics of Meat. These works comment on the lost sexual power in female fertility which is taken for granted in both the human and animal world.
Batten and Kamp are in both a creative and romantic partnership. Sex Tape is, in a nutshell, a literal sex tape of Batten and Kamp filming themselves having sex. The sex tape is then encoded in the USB drive which is in turn encased within a glass and stainless-steel coffee table. The structure of the table is made so that the USB and sex tape is inaccessible unless the collector chooses to destroy the artwork. Aesthetically, the table appears cold, clinical even, reminiscent of sci-fi, futuristic furniture with nothing to hint of the human, carnal nature of the content contained inside. And so, what one might expect from a ‘sex tape,’ an exploration of sex reflecting the power dynamics within the relationship is instead turned towards the audience. In the act of effectively withholding their sex tape from the audience, Batten and Kamp has chosen to direct the query of sex and power dynamics externally, one of power between the artist and the audience/collector. In withholding the sex tape from the audience/collector Batten and Kamp exerts power in preventing the consumption of a piece of themselves and their relationship, but also in enticing and teasing the audience/collector with the conceptual promise of sex. It questions the power dynamic between artist/audience/collector, and comments on the phenomenon where the audience wants more than what the artist would like to give.
