The Untitled Space gallery is pleased to present, “Thoughts and Prayers,” a first United States solo exhibition of works by award-winning British visual artist Sarah Maple. Curated by gallery director Indira Cesarine, “Thoughts and Prayers” opens on January 22nd, 2019, and is view through February 3rd, 2019.
Maple’s exhibition will be the first of a series of solo exhibitions presented by The Untitled Space throughout 2019 featuring artists with an extraordinary body of work that aligns with the gallery’s mission to promote women in art and unique voices that are under-represented.
Sarah Maple is known for her bold, brave, mischievous and occasionally controversial artworks that challenge notions of identity, religion and the status quo. Much of Maple’s inspiration originates from being raised Muslim, with parents of mixed religious and cultural backgrounds. “Thoughts and Prayers” will feature many new works, as well as a selection of some of her most notable past works, exploring a wide variety of media including performance, painting, photography, sculpture, collage, installation, and video. Maple’s pro-feminist artwork provokes a dialogue with her sharp humor and satirical eye. She fearlessly addresses what it means to be a Muslim in the Western world. Her taboo-breaking artwork fights against censorship as she investigates themes of politics, violence, freedom, feminism, and the ironies of pop culture. She often employs self-portraiture as a vehicle for her narrative, or engages guerrilla-style performance as a means to convey her message.
Exclusive Interview with Sarah Maple
– Some of your topics of focus have dealt with identity, and/or the search for, as well finding ones true voice as a female in a male led world. Why do these subjects matter to deeply to you?
I think selfishly because I am a woman and I hate to see women suffer. I think you’d be a robot not to to feel something when you see clear inequalities. We’ve come a long way but there’s still so much further to go. For example the ‘men are from Mars, women are from Venus’ stuff (one of my pet hates) which is so ingrained in our society about supposed gender differences will take generations to change.
– If a young girl were to have a look at one of your artworks, what message or ideal would you wish for her to take with her?
I deal with the theme of shame in my work. I think women are made to feel so much shame about everything, their sexuality, basic bodily functions – their ambitions….if we could teach girls (and boys) about this from a young age maybe we could make an attempt at an equal society.
– If you weren’t an artist, what career would you have?
It doesn’t bare thinking about! To be honesty over dream job is so mind-numbingly boring I would rather keep it to myself haha!
– Any artist past or present that has influenced your work and progression so far?
I absolutely love Sarah Lucas. She has that British sense of humor and fun in her work that I just find so refreshing. She just had a show at New Museum and it reminded me why I was so obsessed with her work when I was younger.
– What do you see as your signature artistic style?
Not being afraid to be controversial.
– What’s next for you?
I have a few shows coming up mainly on the theme of Brexit – the most ridiculous and absurd time to be a Brit! I have returned to painting which has been a joy and I’m looking forward to seeing what people think!