Erotic + Bizarre, PEOPLE at Jeffrey Deitch Los Angeles

LOS ANGELES––Inspired by sculptor Mike Kelley’s (1954 – 2012) 1993 exhibition The Uncanny at Tate Liverpool, group show PEOPLE on exhibition at Jeffrey Deitch (February 9–April 6, 2019) consists of a motley crew of figurative sculptures and an array of materials: bronze, wood, resin, plastic, clay and ceramic.

More than fifty standing, sitting, and hanging sculptures––some exuding an impressive performative element––comprise the multi-generational and emerging artist exhibition, which is expansion of Deitch’s New York gallery’s Like Life exhibition in May 2018, the gallery states.

The works are hard to peg down with styles ranging from hyperrealism to allegory and fabulism. Within this range, they appear to reject and cut at entrenched normative conventions and practices of society. Instead, they reflect the diversity of the artists who made them and that of the people they represent as they explore a multitude of emotions, activities and intersectionalities.

The works explore the uncanny confrontation of the artificial and the real while simultaneously responding to the multiple approaches to human identity in the contemporary world.

The gallery writes that all of the works are the result of a contemporary approach to sculpture “inspired by the innovations of Dada, Surrealism, Assemblage.”

The exhibition features works by John Ahearn, Pawel Althamer, David Altmejd, Vanessa Beecroft, Frank Benson, Ashley Bickerton, Nick Cave, Monster Chetwynd, Liz Craft, Karon Davis, Raul De Nieves, Rachel Feinstein, Urs Fischer, Luis Flores, Isa Genzken, Vanessa German, Katie Grinnan, Duane Hanson, Evan Holloway, Christian Holstad, Thomas Houseago, Alex Israel, Elizabeth Jaeger, Renaud Jerez, Josh Kline, Jeff Koons, Austin Lee, Tau Lewis, Sarah Lucas, Tony Matelli, Paul McCarthy, Barry McGee, Matthew Monahan, Narcissister, Ruby Neri, Simphiwe Nzube, Rob Pruitt, Alison Saar, Kiki Smith, Hajime Sorayama, Katie Stout, Rigoberto Torres, Anna Uddenberg, Stewart Uoo, and Fred Wilson.

Check out the exhibition at Jeffrey Deitch Los Angeles.