University of Guelph fine art students explore excess
Copieux, a student-produced art show organized by fourth-year studio art students Andrea Compton and Konstanza Lau opened at the University of Guelph’s Zavitz Gallery on Jan. 19.
Both artists focused on a wide variety of media and in using their unique visions, applications, and skills, they created a show that not only displayed two voices, but a wide arrangement of personalities.
In their art, four distinct personalities—wild, calm, cheeky, and confident—appeared. Compton commented that their different voices “Display the complexity of how we all project ourselves as people. We can be one person on Facebook and another person with our mother.”
When asked what inspired their theme, Compton and Lau explained their inspiration was related to their title Copieux, a French term that translates into “An abundance in supply or quantity.”
Their show takes influence and is inspired by Jean-Honoré Fragonard’s 1767 Rococo painting titled The Swing, which depicts a young woman on a swing, who tips her foot up in the air, while a young suitor gazes on.
Copieux seeks to approach sexuality in the same way Fragonard did: suggestively and with cheek. While drawing from the past, Compton and Lau seek to critique the type of language and signifiers Western society has conceived over recent years. Signifiers in our visual language were not originally created to imply or describe sex, however, we have socially morphed a number of arbitrary objects and images into having sexual connotations; for example, flowers symbolize not only beauty, but also vaginas.
In Copieux, Compton’s “Firm Grip: Vulva Wall” was a display of a rock climbing wall, but the grips were shaped as vulvas.
“We find that the best way to authentically expose this topic is through humour and cheeky innuendos,” explained Lau. While the show’s undertones seem obvious to some, others might view the show quite innocently, even cluelessly, without reading the titles and explanations of the respective pieces.
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The two student artists showed a wide range of skills in different media including printmaking, painting, sculpture, installation, and writing. With a youth culture that so resolutely depends upon imagery to convey meanings other than literal context, Compton and Lau have tapped into an interesting and provocative niche.
Photos by Nicole Steeves.