Genesis Breyer P-Orridge: Closer as Love
Nina Johnson is proud to present a selection of polaroids by Genesis and Lady Jaye Breyer P-Orridge, opening with a public reception on October 3rd (7-9pm) in the upstairs gallery and remaining on view until November 23rd. Breyer P-Orridge are lovers who fused art with daily life, eventually pursing a series of plastic surgeries to become identical twins鈥攁 plural self they鈥檝e termed a 鈥減androgyne.鈥� This is the first exhibition to focus exclusively on their unaltered polaroids, drawn from the artists鈥� personal archives. Selected by Jarrett Earnest, each focuses on a extreme close-up of their touching, twinning and intertwining bodies. Distinctions are playfully and intentionally obscured, so that the images verge on abstractions of intimacy itself. Explicitly and intensely erotic, the images are the product of the most extreme experiments in art as life, illustrating one of the most beautiful love stories in art history.
Genesis P-Orridge鈥檚 work exploring rituals of the body and sexuality began in England of the late 1960s with the collaborative artist group COUM Transmissions (1969-1976), and extended through the seminal Industrial bands Throbbing Gristle (1975-1981) and then Psychic TV (1981-1991). In Thee Grey Book (1981), one of the foundational texts for the experimental spiritual network Temple of Psychic Youth, P-Orridge described the importance of undoing social constructions around sex and gender: 鈥淥f all the things people do, at home and in private, usually with close friends, sex alone is subject to extraordinary interference and control from outside forces. This is no accident. They recognize its power. Even if only for a few moments, Individuals can release a power and energy from within that renders any system of society, or regime, meaningless. It is a liberator.鈥�
In 1993 P-Orridge fell madly in love with Lady Jaye Breyer, a nurse and dominatrix who had systematically explored the strengths and weakness of the body, as well as a performer in the downtown scene around the club Jackie 60. They started collaborating under the banner of 鈥減androgeny鈥�, for which they used sex rituals to explore altered and higher states of connection and other ways of being. These polaroids partially record this process, which also link to a web of other collages, music, videos, performances and writing. They began taking their own bodies as material, using plastic surgeries as a cut-up process to attempt 鈥渂reaking鈥� inherited ideas of gender and sex, as well as upending conceptions of the body as individual and singular. Ever since they've been referred to collectively as 鈥淏reyer P-Orridge鈥�, using the plural pronouns s/he and he/r, important predecessors of younger generations of gender non-conforming and trans artists.
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Nina Johnson is proud to present a selection of polaroids by Genesis and Lady Jaye Breyer P-Orridge, opening with a public reception on October 3rd (7-9pm) in the upstairs gallery and remaining on view until November 23rd. Breyer P-Orridge are lovers who fused art with daily life, eventually pursing a series of plastic surgeries to become identical twins鈥攁 plural self they鈥檝e termed a 鈥減androgyne.鈥� This is the first exhibition to focus exclusively on their unaltered polaroids, drawn from the artists鈥� personal archives. Selected by Jarrett Earnest, each focuses on a extreme close-up of their touching, twinning and intertwining bodies. Distinctions are playfully and intentionally obscured, so that the images verge on abstractions of intimacy itself. Explicitly and intensely erotic, the images are the product of the most extreme experiments in art as life, illustrating one of the most beautiful love stories in art history.
Genesis P-Orridge鈥檚 work exploring rituals of the body and sexuality began in England of the late 1960s with the collaborative artist group COUM Transmissions (1969-1976), and extended through the seminal Industrial bands Throbbing Gristle (1975-1981) and then Psychic TV (1981-1991). In Thee Grey Book (1981), one of the foundational texts for the experimental spiritual network Temple of Psychic Youth, P-Orridge described the importance of undoing social constructions around sex and gender: 鈥淥f all the things people do, at home and in private, usually with close friends, sex alone is subject to extraordinary interference and control from outside forces. This is no accident. They recognize its power. Even if only for a few moments, Individuals can release a power and energy from within that renders any system of society, or regime, meaningless. It is a liberator.鈥�
In 1993 P-Orridge fell madly in love with Lady Jaye Breyer, a nurse and dominatrix who had systematically explored the strengths and weakness of the body, as well as a performer in the downtown scene around the club Jackie 60. They started collaborating under the banner of 鈥減androgeny鈥�, for which they used sex rituals to explore altered and higher states of connection and other ways of being. These polaroids partially record this process, which also link to a web of other collages, music, videos, performances and writing. They began taking their own bodies as material, using plastic surgeries as a cut-up process to attempt 鈥渂reaking鈥� inherited ideas of gender and sex, as well as upending conceptions of the body as individual and singular. Ever since they've been referred to collectively as 鈥淏reyer P-Orridge鈥�, using the plural pronouns s/he and he/r, important predecessors of younger generations of gender non-conforming and trans artists.
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