Western Exhibitions is pleasantly engorged to present “Where all the D*cks Hang Out” in our Plus Gallery in a show that opens on Saturday, December 16. This show of collages prominently featuring male genitalia is presented concurrently with “Death by Design” in our main gallery. Death and D*cks: can you imagine better holiday season programming!
We were inspired to organize “Where all the D*cks Hang Out” during a trip to Cleveland this summer where we saw an unconscionably dense installation of penis-themed collages by Dana Depew in the basement of the Asterisk Gallery. Depew affixes large and small d*cks onto vintage inspirational plaques, 70’s style shadow box frames, 19th century black and white photos and Norman Rockwell reproductions and we’ll showcase DePew’s perversities on an entire wall in the Plus Gallery.
The artists in “Where all the D*cks Hang Out” come to genitalia collage from a variety of perspectives; gay, straight, lesbian, trans, male, female, whatever. Ryan Travis Christian embellishes art from the antiquities with the member in question; Joe Hardesty’s heavy metal three-fingered devil horn symbol is rendered completely from d*cks found on the web; Rich Lane surreptitiously inserts the subject into contemporary ads and catalog pages; Dutes Miller sexy surreal juxtapositions combine c*cks with lyrical linear work and plantforms; John Neff will show genital blueprints from his recent and ongoing Trans. Portrait and Pornographic Pantograph projects; John Parot’s “Cock Blocked” ink and gouache collage drawings are based from recent events; Tomiko Pilson’s fanciful, illusory landscape featuring masked women, snakes and you-know-what is inspired by the myth of Medusa and examines rapture and castration anxiety; Liz Roth waxes nostalgic on penises that have surprised her in drawing classes; Stan Shellabarger seamlessly inserts gay porn images into banal 1980’s magazine advertisements; Shannon Stratton constructs fantastical penises using etching images from ironwork and decorative ornament patterns.