(SIGNAL) Challenges the Gender Binary

Above: (Detail) Gil Yefman, Tumtum, 2012. Knitting, Faraday cage, sound, 78.74” x 78.74” x 78.74.” Courtesy of the artist and Ronald Feldman Fine Arts, New York. Photo by Elad Sarig / Petach Tikva Museum.

(SIGNAL), curated by Alexis Heller, presents artworks that challenge the gender binary and explore a continuum of self-definition. Working in diverse mediums, 11 contemporary artists utilize code, collaborative representation, fantasy, and play to subvert histories that have denied gender variance. They question authorship over "the natural," make manifest sites of resistance, and reimagine a future where identities are fluid and celebrated as such.

The exhibition features work by Jess T. Dugan, Anahita Ghazvinizadeh, Nicki Green, Rhys Ernst & Zackary Drucker, Young Joon Kwak, Carlos Motta, Cobi Moules, Chelsea Thompto, Gil Yefman, and Rona Yefman.

The exhibition will be on view through April 17 at Smack Mellon. 92 Plymouth St., Brooklyn, N.Y.

Jess T. Dugan, 2012. Pigment print, 24” x 20”. Courtesy of the artist and Catherine Edelman Gallery, Chicago.

Young Joon Kwak, 2013. Laminated archival pigment print mounted on aluminum, 83.5” x 43.75” x 1”. Courtesy of the artist and Commonwealth & Council, Los Angeles.

Rona Yefman, (1997), 2010. Light box, 24” x 36”. Courtesy of the artist and Mitchell and Lauren Presser.

Cobi Moules, 2012. Oil on canvas, 21” x 41.” Courtesy of the artist and Carroll and Sons Gallery, Boston.

Anahita Ghazvinizadeh, 2011. 16:9 video, audio, sound. 17 minutes. Courtesy of the artist.

Chelsea Thompto, 2015, 9/1/15-1/1/16. Burnt wood and charcoal on wall, 1’ x 5’ x 7’. Courtesy of the artist.

Rhys Ernst and Zackary Drucker, 2012. HD video, color, sound, 23 min. Courtesy of the artists and Luis de Jesus Gallery, Los Angeles.

Nicki Green, 2016. Glaze on found brick. 8" x 4" x 3" each. Courtesy of the artist.

Carlos Motta, 2015. 11:45 min. 16:9 video, audio, color, sound. Courtesy of the artist.

The image above, written in a binary code created by Chelsea Thompto, translates into the word SIGNAL. The exhibition’s title begins communication around what happens when the gender binary becomes illegible. In the absence of fixed gender markers, where can we start to understand each other and how do we make ourselves known? The code, and the image works in dialogue as part of, resists the ability to take a ‘quick read’ and requires a more complex process of discovery. By engaging history, acts of defiance, real experiences of violence, and imagination, a more nuanced language of gender possibility emerges. 

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