CACOTOPIA 06 at ANNKA KULTYS GALLERY is featured on the front page of GalleriesNow.
Annka Kultys presents the sixth edition of CACOTOPIA, the gallery’s annual group exhibition that showcases the works of recent Art Masters and Bachelors graduates from universities and London as well as Cecila Fiona who graduated from University of Copenhagen. This year the exhibition presents the works by twelve artists, working in painting, sculpture and new media. CACOTOPIA 06 features the work of Kate Bickmore, Alice Bucknell, Kim Booker, Danielle Brathwaite-Shirley, Shir Cohen, László von Dohnány, Cecilia Fiona, Lydia Pettit, Leon Pozniakow, Catherine Repko, Ai-Da Robot, and Elsa Rouy.
Kate Bickmore (b. 1993) makes immersive, bodily florascapes that are inspired by her experiences as a queer woman, and how her body relates to the environments around her. Each work seduces the viewer into a world simultaneously realistic and fantastic — one that intimately weaves the surfaces, depths, and desires of my body with the floral landscape. Her art aims to bring a new perspective to the canon of women and nature that embraces agency, physicality, queerness, female desire, and the unknown through sensory expansiveness and immersive, cosmic feeling.
Alice Bucknell (b. 1993) is a North American artist and writer based in London. Working primarily through game engines, her current work explores interconnections of architecture, ecology, magic, and non-human and machine intelligence.
Kim Booker (b. 1983) practice is rooted in the tradition of painting and the history of modern art. Drawing inspiration from titans of the media such as Georg Baselitz and Willem de Kooning, Booker reinterprets the tradition with a current perspective on contemporary times and conflicts. Her process and mark making is an extension of her body and evolution of emotions.
Danielle Brathwaite-Shirley (b. 1995) is an artist living and working in London. Brathwaite-Shirley uses interactive technology to relate to the experiences of trans black experiences, putting into perspective the daily decision and circumstances the community is faced with. From daily interactions to medical impositions, Brathwaite-Shirley’s work highlights the story of black trans lives through the lens of video games.
Shir Cohen (b. 1990) uses imagery to respond to the political climate surrounding her. During lockdown, Cohen found herself lacking supply of the materials she typically uses in her artwork and therefore resorted to using textiles and embroider. On the fabric medium, she often times depicts violent historic and mythological scenes, using the visual vocabulary to respond to the absurdity of the world around her.
László von Dohnány (b. 1990). von Dohnány’s compositions mediates on digital forms translating to traditional media and how technological developments become the animating force of culture. Through the traditional medium of oil on canvas, von Dohnány uses the visual lexicon of technology that has become so familiar in recent years. The paintings depict jungles made up of wires, digitally rendered leaves and emoji-like fruits.
Cecilia Fiona (b. 1997, Denmark), received her Bachelors degree in art history from the University of Copenhagen, 2021. Indulging in the dreamscape of unconsciousness, Cecilia Fiona’s scenes of surreality illustrate figures that mix human and fantasy with colourful landscapes, rich and texture through her use of Rabbit-Skin glue. Simultaneously chaotic and serene, the viewer becomes lost within the artist’s imagination.
Lydia Pettit’s (b. 1991) paintings confront the viewer with depictions of herself, portraying her body in raw and vivid framings and, in doing so exposing her vulnerabilities. While primarily working in paint, the artists also employs fibre art into her body of work, translating brushstrokes to needle and thread.
Leon Pozniakow (b. 1987) Beginning his artistic career with works on paper, Leon Pozniakow’s practice has expanded to more sculptural forms, utilising media such that includes paint, enamel, chainmail, glass and gemstones. In a portrayal of intimacy both psychological and sexual, the body of work evokes a theme of erotic romanticism present in both the contemporary works and earlier draftsmanship.
Catherine Repko’s (b. 1990) compositions are a sentimental portrait of a childhood filled with freedom and creativity. Fond and touching memories are stamped upon the canvas in matte colours mimicking collage. The pallets of warm earth tones and casual affection between the figures create an aura of safety and intimacy. Growing up the third of four sisters, Repko’s body of work questions the identity, sisterhood and experience of girlhood and passage to womanhood.
Ai-Da Robot (b. 2019) was Created and built by Engineered Arts, the Oxford-based specialists in developing humanoid and semi-humanoid robots. Ai-Da creates her art by capturing images using the camera in her eye, which are then processed by her AI algorithms to become real space coordinates, which she then turns into drawings using her robotic arm. Like other artists, from Rembrandt and his workshops during the Dutch Golden Age to Damien Hirst and his dot paintings, she collaborates with others to produce her paintings and sculptures.
Elsa Rouy (b. 2000). Erotic, explicit and exaggerated, Rouy’s challenging portrayals fo the human form seem to sway between the infliction of pain and pleasure. Intimate moments of sexual acts and bodily fluid are reoccurring themes in compositions of contorted and mutilated bodies. The artist’s exploration of the female body brings into question possession, exploitation, and anxieties around reproduction.