Handiedan: Translucent Skin

Yes its true, Handiedan's exhibition "Translucent Skin" opens on Saturday. Yes, there will be 15 originals on display, as well as two edition prints, an exclusive T-Shirt available, and other surprises. The shirts wont be sold on our website, so make sure you send us an email if you are interested in one. Also, we will be pouring Heineken and Grolsch at the opening in honor of Handiedan's home country. The event space is provided by newly formed Blaq Ink Gallery in Huntington Beach, CA, who kindly enough have joined forces with us to host the opening reception.



HANDIEDAN: TRANSLUCENT SKIN

Phone Booth Gallery is pleased to present “Translucent Skin,” a solo exhibition of mixed media artwork by Dutch artist Handiedan. The show will run from December 19 to January 21, 2010 and the opening party will be held December 19th from 7-10 pm. The all ages event is a dual effort between Phone Booth Gallery and Blaq Ink Gallery and will be at 126 Main St, No. 103, Huntington Beach, CA, 92648. The exhibition will be accompanied by a limited edition shirt released by Sullen Clothing and two of Handiedan’s ever-popular editioned prints.

A confluence of fragility, sexiness, nostalgia, and empowerment, “Translucent Skin” explores the tangled relationship between bodies and their histories. Skin has an unsettling yet strangely lyrical presence in Handiedan’s work—images of limbs, faces, and torsos often disappear into the yellowed surface of the collage, or spread out and soak into the layers of Handiedan’s images in a way that is physically impossible but surprisingly convincing.

Pin-up girls, defiantly complicated symbols of sexuality, play a central role in the exhibition, often appearing in groups of two or more. In past work, Handiedan has maintained an intentional tension between the bodies that interact in her work, but in the recent piece she created for this show, “Translucent No. 2,” bodies of pin-up girls twist into each other, at times becoming indistinguishable from one another. Yet Handiedan still manages to maintain a sense of distance.

In “Translucent No. 2,” two full-figured girls, one blonde and one brunette, sit together. The brunette’s legs triangulate the blonde’s face, and her hand grips the blonde’s hair. Yet the girls do not acknowledge one another’s presence; the blonde’s face looks out of the picture, and the brunette’s face has been rubbed out so she is no longer even capable of seeing.

The contrast between old and new has always been central to Handiedan’s work. She collects antique images and objects from flea markets around the world, choosing materials that will be familiar to a large number of people but still appear intimate and personal. Then she cuts into history and revitalizes it by taking apart the nostalgic stories her materials tell and adeptly composing nuanced new ones. In “Translucent Skin,” Victorian propriety collides with Burlesque, and the Wild West merges with Classic Hollywood. The weathered, aged quality of Handiedan’s materials is preserved, and girlish doodles dance across the surface of each image. Using pen and ink, an unforgiving medium, as her primary drawing tool, Handiedan imbues the collages with an impulsive, in-the-moment quality. Her work becomes alive and assertive despite its attachment to the past.