Kendall Koppe is delighted to welcome Margot Samel, New York and annouce a solo exhibition by Narcissister (b. 1971, New York, US) at the gallery. This is the artist's first solo exhibition with the gallery and in the UK. The collabration continues to build on the spirit of exchange and in establishing communities and dialouge cross galleires and their programmes.
Narcissister focuses on race, gender, and sexuality through a constant renegotiation of the self, and its inherent performative nature within contemporary society against heteronormative structures of surveillance and policing. Drawing from the myth of Narcissus, self-possession becomes a strategy where humor is deployed to turn a lens back on the ways contemporary society rewards a specific kind of female narcissism. Appropriating methods of self-presentation through combining her professional experience as a dancer and the methodologies of Black radical feminism, her constant performative persona amplifies the ways in which those prescribed as sexually and racially deviant from "the norm" have always had to reinvent what was expected of them in order to survive.
Narcissister (b. 1971, New York, US) is a Brooklyn-based artist and performer. She received a B.A. in Afro-American Studies at Brown University and studied modern dance at Alvin Ailey American Dance Theatre. Solo exhibitions include: Wimmin, Artpace, San Antonio, TX (2019); Narcissister, Studies for Participatory Sculptures, Participant Inc, New York, NY (2014); New Video Work, Petrella's Imports, New York, NY (2013); Narcissister is You, Envoy Enterprises, New York, NY (2013). Selected group exhibitions include: Spikes that bite, Margot Samel, New York, NY (2022-23); Role Play, Fondazione Prada, Milan, Italy (2022); pornotopia revised, Kunsthalle Exnergasse, Vienna, Austria (2022); Friends & Family, Magenta Plains, New York, NY (2021); Punch, Deitch Projects, Los Angeles, CA (2019); A Detached Hand, Magenta Plains, New York, NY (2019); Sculpture for People, Deitch Projects, Los Angeles, CA, (2019); No body to talk to, Invisible Exports, New York, NY (2019); Honey, Bodega Gallery, New York, NY (2018); Sculpture for People, Deitch Projects, New York, NY (2018); Cosí fan tutte, Archivio di Videoarte del Veneto, Verona, Italy (2016); This one is smaller than this one, Postmasters Gallery, New York, NY (2016); Harlem Postcards, The Studio Museum in Harlem, New York, NY (2015); Check Your Vernacular, Rhode Island School of Design, Memorial Hall, Providence, RI (2014); Draped Down, The Studio Museum in Harlem, New York, NY (2014). Upcoming group exhibitions include: Multiplicity: Collage in Contemporary America, Frist Art Museum, Nashville, TN, in September 2023; The Cult of Beauty, Wellcome Collection, London, UK in October 2023.
