Kate Clark's Only One Rule is like a strange little zoo tucked into Chelsea. The gallery feels small in comparison to the towering taxidermied sculptures: stacked antelope busts, two full sized zebras, and a huddle of coyotes, all of which have haunting sculpted human faces covered with patches of animal hide, and large unblinking eyes. In addition to these pieces, Only One Rule also shows a bear's bust and a few collages, which depict hyper-realistic drawings of Clark's sculptures surrounded by bursts of colorful, graphic silhouettes of animal horns.
Clark, a Brooklyn-based artist, specializes in such sculptures, which invite the viewer to consider the relationship between humans and animals, pushing our understandings of gender, identity, and race. Clark's work is shocking, even unpleasant and uncanny at first. Nonetheless, these sculptures raise important ideas about speciesism and expose our anthropocentric tendencies.
While Only One Rule is intriguing, it is also somewhat hypocritical in its exploration of power dynamics between humans and animals. The reason why she is able to create these sculptures from previously living creatures is because they have been killed. Were these taxidermy animals obtained humanely? Does her work honor the lives of the animals whose bodies she's sculpted? If she is pointing out how we value human lives over animal lives, does her practice itself reduce animals into objects to be altered and displayed? Ultimately, these ethical dilemmas are important to consider, in terms of the ways her work may also operate because of the mistreatment of animals.
Brittney Fang, Revised
Something you included which I found to be incredibly important to this review were the challenges you made and questions relating the to ethics of Clark's work, as I'm sure many of the viewers were wondering the same things. You also described her sculptures in a way that brought forth empathy and even fear, which I certainly felt after viewing the show.
ReplyDeleteSimilar to what Moira has said, your questions are very insightful and highlight the flaws in the work. I think creating work with taxidermy is a very nuanced and difficult method to practice in a way that is ethical. Creating a narrative where animals are quite literally being valued more because they have been made into humans can give the audience a strange read. These pieces are being shown in a chelsea gallery, and probably sell for a large sum of money. The artist does toe the line with objectifying and commodifying animal bodies.
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