A view of "Beyond the Looking Glass," an exhibition of works by 14 female-identifying artists on view at UTA Artist Space through July 31. Photo by Jeff McLane
Like almost every other woman in the world, Zuzanna Ciolek grew up receiving the message that women needed to look a certain way, and act a certain way, in order to be worthy of love. Love not only from romantic partners, but also, love from an economy that monetizes beauty. “I grew up as any teenager might looking at magazines, which depicted women who were usually white and thin, and who usually looked traditionally feminine,” Ciolek says. “It didn’t feel like me.”
Ciolek, who is the director of the UTA Artist Space, a venue designed by Ai Weiwei, and opened by the United Talent Agency in 2018, began pondering an exhibition that would serve as a playful rebellion against traditional standards of feminine beauty in 2019. “I wanted it to show a wide range of work,” she says. “And I wanted it to be a visual feast.”
The resulting exhibition, “Beyond the Looking Glass,” is open at UTA Artist Space through this upcoming Saturday, July 31. Featuring 14 women-identifying artists, at first glance, the exhibition is deceptively pretty. Clean, orderly, and featuring quite a bit of millennial pink. A closer examination of the works on display is necessary to unveil their subversive elements. For example, the ceramic sculptures of Charlotte Colbert, which are perched on bubblegum pedestals. Mameria (2019) is a vessel composed of a dozen or so breasts — some of them perky and perfect, and others marred by scars and missing nipples. It’s joined by C-section Vessel (2021), an imperfect urn that bears the tell-tale — but never talked about — signs of a c-section on a female torso, which are the scar, but also, the accompanying flap of skin and fat that hangs over the scar and can only be completely erased by a tummy tuck.
