featured gallery for December 1999

Bodies of Resistance

BODIES OF RESISTANCE is the first major contemporary art exhibition in ten years to reconsider the AIDS pandemic in the United States. More importantly, it is the first significant art initiative to question the global impact of the disease, and the complex relationships between the West and the developing world regarding AIDS. Fifteen new works have been produced specifically for the exhibition by artists based in South Africa, the UK and the USA, and originally from Canada, Cuba, Hong Kong, India, and Nigeria.

As the title suggests, all of the work, whether video projection, digital photography, installation, sculpture or painting, considers the body as a potential site of resistance - to disease, desire, death, societal prejudice or technology. Directly and indirectly, the works reflect concerns about global issues such as the wide scale spread of the virus across Africa and Asia, policies of medical research, developments in genetic engineering, inequalities in the global distribution of wealth and technology, the availability of medication world-wide and differing cultural perspectives on dying.
Bodies of Resistance raises pertinent questions about the spread of HIV/AIDS locally, nationally and globally, and considers the implications of the continuing pandemic as we move into the next millennium. The project provides a creative forum through which audiences can explore their own questions and fears related to HIV/AIDS.
1. Aziz and Cucher "Chimera 1" (Transmorphica Series) 58" x 30" c-print 1998

2. Aziz and Cucher "Chimera 2" (Transmorphica Series) 58" x 30" c-print 1998

3. Rina Banerjee "An Uncertain Bondage is Deserved When Threatening Transmission" mixed media 1999

4. Rina Banerjee "The Nature of Illness, View 1" size variable mixed media 1999

5. Rina Banerjee "The Nature of Illness, View 2" size variable mixed media 1999

6. Sunil Gupta "From Here to Eternity, View 1" 40"x 40", c-print 1999

7. Sunil Gupta "From Here to Eternity, View 2" 40"x 40", c-print 1999

8. Ernesto Pujol "Gulliver's Dream, Part A" 36" x 60", ink jet print 1999

9. Ernesto Pujol "Gulliver's Dream, Part B" 36" x 60", ink jet print 1999

10. Steed Taylor "Birthday Knot 1" 25'x75', house paint on asphalt 1999

11. Steed Taylor "Birthday Knot 2" (Detail) 25'x75', house paint on asphalt 1999

12. Albert Winn, from "Jewish Summer Camp" series, 11"x 14", Gelatin Silver Print 1997

13. Albert Winn, from "Jewish Summer Camp" series, 11"x 14", Gelatin Silver Print 1997

Curator

Barbara Hunt

Temp File Hunt Portrait15C2D2896890D86 23343316
Barbara Hunt is an independent curator, lecturer and arts administrator. She was born in Wegberg, W Germany and grew up in England. She currently resides in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. She received a postgraduate diploma in Gallery and Museum studies at the University of Manchester, England and a BA in Visual and Performed Arts at the University of Kent at Canterbury, England. She has been the Executive Director of Visual AIDS for the past two and a half years. On January 1st, Barbara will move into her new role as Executive Director of Artists Space in New York City. Bodies of Resistance is funded in part by: the British Council, the Debs Foundation, the Mary J. Hutchins Foundation, the Horace W. Goldsmith Foundation, the Robert D. Farber Foundation and the Kettering Family Foundation