
LABOR IN REPOSE Brit Barton on Nicole Wermers at Kunsthaus Glarus
Firmly embedded in art historical tradition, the reclining (female) figure may be read as an antidote to a present characterized by radical change and uncertainty. At the same time, it also appears to embody a state of universal exhaustion. In Nicole Wermers’s current exhibition, “Reclining Fanmail” at Kunsthaus Glarus, the classic pose is contrasted with modern-day utility carts, recalling Mierle Laderman Ukeles’s Manifesto for Maintenance Art (1969) – and with it, issues of class and gender relations within contemporary art. Reviewing Wermers’s recent work through the lens a crisis-laden Western world, the artist Brit Barton traces further associations and possible reference points – from anti-immigration policies over disinfectants all the way down to the pervasive grief of globalism and art world commodification.
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