Coke Wisdom O’Neal "Blue Nude"
Mixed Greens Gallery
This event has ended.
Mixed Greens announces "Blue Nude," Coke Wisdom O’Neal’s fifth solo exhibition with the gallery. Over the past five years, O’Neal has become known for his monumental plywood boxes, where people are invited to climb in and be photographed. In this new series, the box and its participants–a now diminutive and transparent container with nude inhabitants–have changed significantly. What was once a project about space, identity, and identification has become a venture exploring anonymity, constraint, and escape.
In both photographic series, O’Neal uses the sculptural box as a framing device. In the past, the subjects were given the space and freedom to comfortably explore the structure, and were encouraged to include autobiographical props or to stage a scene. In this iteration, O’Neal’s cruelly small box is lidded, rejecting the notion of movement or even much choice in bodily orientation. The interior often becomes laden with perspiration and steam—the aftereffects of a body contorted in a small, confined space. Instead of looking for signifiers of individuality in the subject’s expression, clothing, props, and posture, these photos leave the viewer searching for tiny signs of identity in a tattoo, ring, or the shape of foot.
Media
Schedule
from February 17, 2011 to March 19, 2011
Opening Reception on 2011-02-17 from 18:00 to 20:00