Fractured Figure – Works from the Dakis Joannou Collection is a show that reflects, with its concept, scope, and synergies, both the way an increasing number of artists are viewing the human form and the way that very different, but equally legitimate realities, comprise our experience of the world. Fractured Figure represents a sense of cultural dysphoria, a state of dissatisfaction and anxiety, the opposite of euphoria.
The selected works for the exhibition show that the new approach to the figure is more about the real world than the ideal world. Rather than idealized or fantasized forms, figures are fractured, exploded, broken, and imperfect much like victims of suicide bombers. The artist is looking to the street and to current events rather than to the firmament. It is responding to a world where optimistic assumptions about peace and progress have been overwhelmed by political, economic, and environmental challenges. In the aftermath of 9/11 and the Iraq War, the question is often asked, “Where is the political art?” The most compelling new art is not political in a propagandistic way, but rather more personal and reflective of a state of mind.
Curated by Jeffrey Deitch with Massimiliano Gioni as curatorial advisor, the Fractured Figure bears artistic witness to a fractured world and calls for a renewed embrace of humanity. The exhibition is designed by artist Urs Fischer with the participation of Patrick Arnold, Jeffrey Deitch, Massimiliano Gioni, and Dakis Joannou. An extension of the show will be presented in DESTE’s “Yellow Room Gallery” from April 2008 onwards.
