"Striptease", the title of the exhibition at the Kunstmuseum is more than just politically incorrect.
"Striptease" teases with irresistible thrill of the boudoir as well as the dense atmosphere of erotic shops in red light districts. At the same time however the exhibition deals with one of the central motifs of art history, the nude that serves to seduce the senses, and even more specific, to seduce the eye to see.
Artistic depiction of the naked body ls closely linked to traditions and ideologies. On the one hand in Christian tradition perceived as incident, it was at the same time seen as the natural state of the human being and therefore judged as pure end authentic. With the Renaissance the human being became more of a focus and moved to the center of attention. As a consequence the study of the nude became one of the basic programs at the new founded Academies where until the 19th century it was not allowed to depict women models. This however did not prevent artists to create phantasms of mythological narratives and nude deities. Transferred to the bourgeois salon however similar nudities were bound to end in scandals.
The present has changed its relation to the naked body due to the influence of mass media and global communication. Naked bodies are not taboos any more, they have even become a stereotype of contemporary marketing strategies: sex sells. Traditional values on the other hand have lost their validity, the borderline between private and public has broken down. Even so the image of a nude still refers to the taboos of the past, while telling the existential drama of today.
"Veiling and Unveiling": opposites are combined as well as suspended. The exhibition deals with the erotic appeal of the naked, often female body: beginning with Lucas Cranach's "Venus With Cupido" or Ferdinand Hodler's famous allegorical figures. But "Striptease" also tells the story of contemporary depictions of the nude, of marketing strategies and sexist abuse, of exhibitionism and voyeurism, including major works by Candice Breitz, Velie Export, Sylvie Fleury, Felix Gonzelez-Torres, Urs Luthi, Manon, Pipilotti Rist.
Shameless the exhibition "Striptease" uncovers art historic veils and shows - in dialogue across different media and epochs - the works from private and public collections for once quite naked.