Through large-scale paintings on canvas and wood, I parallel these women with my own characters, my “show ponies.” They perform too, caught between spectacle and survival, beauty and burden. The works are bright, colorful, and even funny at first glance, but that is part of the trick. Beneath all the polish is exhaustion, resilience, and
Through large-scale paintings on canvas and wood, I parallel these women with my own characters, my “show ponies.” They perform too, caught between spectacle and survival, beauty and burden. The works are bright, colorful, and even funny at first glance, but that is part of the trick. Beneath all the polish is exhaustion, resilience, and defiance, layers that most men will never notice. And that is the joke.
Across the exhibition, red, white, and blue motifs appear as symbols of freedom, control, nostalgia, and the contradiction between them. The carousel repeats throughout the space as well, a cycle of performance that never stops and a reminder of how captivity and longing for the past continue to shape the present.
This exhibition is not about reliving history. It is about reclaiming it. The Show Ponies gives these women, and women today, the chance to take up space, to laugh, and to be seen on their own terms. It invites viewers to sit with their gaze, to question what they find beautiful, and to recognize the irony in it all.