SEXXXITECTURE:
Alejandro Almanza Pereda, Daniel Gerwin, Rebekah Goldstein, Roman Liška, Max Maslansky, May Wilson, and Jake Ziemann

"Any relationship between a building and its users is one of violence, for any use means the intrusion of a human body into a given space, the intrusion of one order into another." - Bernard Tschumi in Architecture and Disjunction

CULT | Aimee Friberg Exhibitions is pleased to present SEXXXITECTURE, a group exhibition featuring works by Alejandro Almanza Pereda, Daniel Gerwin, Rebekah Goldstein, Roman Liška, Max Maslansky, May Wilson and Jake Ziemann. The exhibition will open on Wednesday, July 1 with a public reception from 6–8PM and will be on view through August 1, 2015.

SEXXXITECTURE explores the complex relationship between architecture and people. The works in the exhibition examine how formal design and structure dramatically shape our experience of place as well as our encounters with others. Line, color and form have the power to create intense human desire. Where and how does the aesthete get turned on? Why is a well-appointed apartment, a luxury high-rise, or a designer house such an aphrodisiac to some? The artists featured in SEXXXITECTURE engage with fantasy and anticipation through diverse media, demonstrating how the built environment informs human sexual dynamics and inviting the viewer to question how we perceive and identify cues of visual arousal.

Alejandro Almanza Pereda’s totemic sculptures investigate the limits of his materials, defying the viewer’s expectations of what is physically possible; they seem to suspend reality in the same way as making love can erase consciousness of time and space. May Wilson uses volume, weight, and texture as references to skin and sausage-like appendages, finding humor in forms that are anthropomorphic yet created from inorganic, highly-processed industrial materials. Jake Ziemann’s ceramic sculptures slump and posture atop pedestals crafted from utilitarian materials such as crates and bricks, referencing both idiosyncratic nuances in the human shape and bodily gestures–and playfully emphasizing the obvious association between phallus and skyscrapers.

Daniel Gerwin, Rebekah Goldstein and Roman Liška’s works have less explicit formal relationships to the body, but reference it in other ways. Goldstein’s strong sense of color and playful perspectives suggest windows and doors that one could creep or crawl through–perhaps on the way to a forbidden tryst–and her titles suggest the pinks of flesh and genitals. Gerwin’s deconstructed home interiors evoke nostalgic recollections of intimate interactions through use of trompe l’oeil. Liška’s formalist constructions of sharp diagonals in contrast with materials of burlap and corrugated rubber evoke a sensual tension, suggesting censorship and bondage. Max Maslansky’s erotic scenes, created by painting images from 1970s pornography stills onto bed sheets, offer a peek into the illicit realm of the retro boudoir, where the lovers frolic amid the lines of mid-century modern furnishings.