The Public Body .2

The second exhibition in a three-part speculation on one idea, this year THE PUBLIC BODY .02 brings together the work of over forty artists and collectives from the 1970s to the present, integrating the archival and the contemporary to draw connections between works across decades. Extending on THE PUBLIC BODY .01’s exploration of contemporary representations of the body and, in particular, the naked and/or sexualised body, the second iteration delves further back to highlight a range of practices embedded in feminist, queer and anti-racist subjectivities. The exhibition includes new works alongside key contributions from renowned artists whose practices have been central to contemporary art’s consideration of the body as agent and instrument. In THE PUBLIC BODY .02 bodies are displaced, contaminated, insatiable and vulnerable; attempting to function within the constraints of the flesh and challenging its limits through a performative refrain. Bodies are both witnessed and witnessing. Some take refuge in the safety and power of distinct communities and networks, while others struggle to free themselves from the dictates of systems that reduce and subjugate