Slava & Brian (a La Petite Mort Gallery di Ottawa)

A couple of days ago I received an email from Canada, Guy Berube, director of La Petite Mort Gallery (a name that says it all and I admit made me love the gallery immediately) from Ottawa, Ontario, was the sender. He  spoke to me about the exhibition ‘ Interpenetration’ to be held from September 2 to October 2. Guy tells me that this is the first time that the two artists in the exhibition, Slava Mogutin and Brian Kenny, partner in life and also in art, from time to time as Superm, have an exhibition together in Canada. Distant from us, but certainly interesting if we think about the two names involved. Mogutin has attracted international attention with its raw and candid photographic representation of urban environments, subcultures, fetishes, youth in his acclaimed ‘Lost Boys’, his 2006 monography. More recently, his photographs were also accompanied by performance art, where the viewer is provoked in his voyeuristic role, the artist is always hovering between the intensely personal and the overtly theatrical, between being the main protagonist or just a witness of something that has happened, with pictures documenting the remaining traces.

In contrast to the photographs of Mogutin are Kenny’s drawings, who have a very distinct stylistic approach, influenced by the energy and spirit of street art. Kenny deconstructs pop and sports references, to create a sort of contemporary expressionist landscape that oscillates between autobiography, social commentary and absurd.

Here they are together in this exhibition, in which to be studied are issues related to the compenetration, which can literally relate to the intersections of experiences of the two artists, as seen through their works, but considering also their relationship as partners in real life. You get to explore things dear to Mogutin, such as the fluidity of sexual identity, the exchange of power between dominance and submission, in wrestling, for example, but also in the S + M imaginary. The show’s title seems to remember also Slava’s private life, the history of emigration from his homeland to the United States, where he was granted political asylum with the support of Amnesty International and PEN American Center.

The exhibition curated by the same Berube will definitely have people talk and in our opinion is a totally must-see.

And what about Italy?

Brian Kenny ‘Bad Recognition (2010)’, ink on vintage American shooting target paper
22.5” x 34″

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