During the month of June, businesses and communities across the country commemorate the Stonewall Uprising and celebrate the history of LGBTQIA visibility, justice, and culture. This month, a new UTA exhibition has opened to highlight queer artists for pride with a celebrity guest curator. Ceramics Faculty Wesley Harvey is among the artists personally selected by actor and producer Elliot Page (and Harison Tenzer) in the group show, “for love, for art, and for being,” now open and accessible online.
The exhibition brings together the work of eighteen artists across the country from different backgrounds and mediums with a heavy emphasis on figurative work. “In a world where conformity often reigns supreme, this exhibition boldly defies the norm, spotlighting the myriad forms of expression embraced by queer artists,” states the curatorial statement. “From painting to photography, abstraction to figuration, each piece serves as a testament to the rich complexity of queer identity.” The exhibition gets its title from Halberstam’s The Queer Art of Failure, “which explores alternatives to conventional understandings of success and expression in a heteronormative society.” In that vein, this exhibition underscores the diverse and personal experiences of the artists included. United Talent Agency is a global entertainment company that represents artists, athletes, and other professionals in the entertainment industry. They have locations in California, Chicago, London, Malmö, Miami, Nashville, New York, and now Midtown Atlanta.
Senior Lecturer and Graduate Director Wesley Harvey has two pieces in the exhibition: a glitter-coated bear vessel and golden-rimmed platter, emblazoned with a vintage pin-up-boy decal that has become iconic in his work. His work examines gay male sexuality through the lens of queer theory using appropriation of imagery and objects. He draws viewers in with seductive and glimmering materials to discuss what used to be considered deviant and racy, tying in themes of fantasy, excess, masculinity, and the taboo.
“When asked by the UTA Artist Space to participate in this exhibition, it was an immediate YES!” Harvey shared when discussing the opportunity. “I was excited to be included in a great roster of artists helping to support the Trans Justice Funding Project in partnership with Elliot Page. I couldn’t think of a better exhibition to be in during Pride month and honored to help support and fight for basic rights that belong to everyone.” This exhibition is not the first time Harvey has used the success of his sales to advocate for queer organizations and often donates a portion of his sales to AID Atlanta.
Wesley Harvey is originally from Van Buren, Indiana. He received his BFA in Ceramics in 2002 from Indiana University in Bloomington, Indiana and then received his MFA in Ceramics in 2007 from Texas Tech University in Lubbock, Texas. Wesley has exhibited his artwork both nationally and internationally, and is also a curator. His artwork can be found in various publications including Ceramics Monthly, Art in America, 500 Contemporary Ceramic Sculptures, the Essential Guide to Mold Making & Slip Casting, and more. His artwork is included in permanent and private collections in the United States, South America, China, and Italy. In the spring of 2017, Wesley had artwork in the Whitney Biennial exhibiting as a participating member of Debtfair, an installation and project of Occupy Museums. Harvey is represented by Signature Gallery (GA), the Red Clay Lodge Center (MT), and Sherrie Gallery (OH) among others. He currently has work up in the exhibition “Colors of Love” at the Coca-Cola headquarters office through the month of June.
More about Wesley Harvey’s sculptural and ceramic work:
My current body of artwork examines gay male sexuality through the lens of queer theory using appropriation of imagery and objects. I want to address the social and cultural issues and implications of homosexuality in a society that is becoming more accepting of what used to be a scarlet letter worn only in the shadows of back alleys and dimly lit rooms. I want to examine not only the normative behavior but also the deviant lifestyle that often gets neglected and chastised. With previous artwork, I was examining my surroundings and personal encounters as the influence for the start of the collage process. Recently, I have put myself aside as the starting point and have begun looking at others, almost in a voyeuristic way, using personal ads posted on dating websites, mobile dating/sex applications, and chat rooms. In this online realm, I can find both the normative and the deviant behaviors that interest me to create the narratives that often begin as works on paper and transition to ceramics, both on my functional artwork and vessel-based pieces.
The Baroque and Rococo periods provide a great source of inspiration for me. The use of gold and floral designs in excess give me a visual overload of imagery and objects that deeply satisfy my tawdry desires. Ancient Greek and Roman pottery are an endless source for my starting point when working with ceramics. Kitsch and popular culture let me appropriate an endless supply of imagery that teeters from the extreme tacky to the candy-coated sickness that lies in the heart of both kitsch and popular culture. Drag queens share my love of gold, glitter, and excessive prettiness that I adore. Illustrations from 1960’s male physique magazines allow me to appropriate a fantasy male subject who is handsome and extremely physically fit, that interacts with other men in encounters that ride a line between caring and loving to deviant sexual acts that can be sometimes hard to look at.