LUCY DODD

Dodd’s previous exhibitions have often originated with interpretations of the visual forms and qualities of iconic works from art history, such as Picasso’s Guernica (for a show at the Rubell Foundation, 2014) and Botticelli’s Birth of Venus (at The Whitney Museum, 2016). In the current exhibition, however, the symbols are primarily of a planetary and cosmological nature.

Conceived as three acts or stages, the show revolves around the cinema-size painting Miss Mars. In contrast with Earth, the only planet in the solar system that expresses life on its crust, Mars reveals his luminous centre with his two moons in the background amongst a series of hazy galaxies.

Miss Mars is the drama of the exhibition. The words, four letters each.

Mars: Masculine: war, violence, power.

Miss: Feminine. Also: missing.

The absence, as part of the story of this show, of that masculine (Mars) energy and the need for its transformation. The search for the feminine aspect of the warrior. And then the whole drama unfolds. Miss (missing) Mars leads, to the discovery of MISS MARS, the feminine aspect of the warrior. The planet Mars, the warrior, the Red planet, splitting open and giving birth to Miss Mars, an Aries baby, a little girl. And also a man in drag.

Miss Mars is reversible. And also a man in dragon.

The drama continues in the next room. Here everything is lost and the way forward is obscured. The dark night of the soul. Here is Mars as St George, the dragon slayer and patron saint of England, and a painting produced on the floor of The George and Dragon pub. It is an index of the people that spent time there during one evening. The mirage of the cellar doors fades into the well-trodden desire lines that lead to the bar or door. The floor rises to become a sail. This space is watched over by an owl with ovary-like eyes.

And, upstairs, in triumph, in conclusion: LIGHT!

Lucy Dodd (*1981 in New York) lives and works in Kingston, NY. She completed studies at Art Center College of Design, CA (2004), and Bard College, NY (2011). Selected solo shows include Open Plan: Lucy Dodd, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York (2016); Buttercut, Power Station, Dallas (2016); Guernika, Rubell Family Collection, Miami (2014) and Welcome to the White Bottom, Pro Choice, Vienna (2010). Recent group shows and performances include Dreaming Mirrors | Dreaming Screens, Sprüth Magers, Berlin (2016); Venganza (I Don’t Want to be Friends), Armada, Milan (2015); Maize Mantis with Sergei Tcherepnin, The Kitchen, New York (2015) and Tropical Year Zero, Church of Saint Luke and Saint Matthew, New York (2012).