Deadline for applications is Tuesday 18 February to attend our free art-writing course, in collaboration with Bergen Kunsthall and Office for Contemporary Art Norway.
With their tribal tattoos facing the world, the sculptures of Anna Uddenberg shed a light on class and gender stereotypes. As part of the biennale, these sculptures Transit Mode β Abenteuer [Transit Mode β Adventure], had an audience from all over the world, each making their way by plane, train or automobile to see humbling reality of modern travel reflected back at them. While mobility remains the utmost global privilege, privilege-with-a-capital-P is measured by hard cash and legroom within plane cabins.
The consumption patterns enacted by the work suggest aspirations to luxury: beige quilted fabric handbags and strollers are tilted at a weird angle, as if a sport utility vehicle popped out a baby. Cutesy Counts , , mixed media, 75 x 95 x 85 cm.
For example, BFF Twin Torso perches a set of breasty humanoid conjoined twins atop a coffee table while their hands come together to form a heart shape. The Clip is a grey butterfly hair clip sculpted by Uddenberg to gigantic proportion, and looks like the desiccated rib cage of a dinosaur.
She told me in a recent studio visit she was particularly interested in this work because it looked both scary and sexy and once. This vagina dentata vibe would befit most of her work. Bff Twin Torso, , mixed media, 1. In the sex industry, this phrase describes a woman hired to act like your girlfriend β privileging intimacy over sex β but to Uddenberg it stood also for the emotional labor required of her as a woman in a male-dominated art world.
