Caroline Wells Chandler

Beach Bois is a solo exhibition of new, site-specific work by Caroline Wells Chandler. Taking The Large Bathers by Paul Cézanne (a local treasure at the Philadelphia Museum of Art) as a jumping off point, Chandler has produced a new series of figures which he describes as Queer Bathers.

These Queer Bathers, hand crocheted by the artist in wool, depict joyful, larger-than-life swimming figures in mid-stroke. Their colorful bodies, smiling faces, and stretching arms emerge from water while their midsections and kicking legs remain immersed and refracted. Their graphic rendering emphasizes select details, like the double mastectomy FTM top surgery scars shown in luminous hues, which speak to a consistent theme of non-conformity within Chandler’s work, the literal blurring of lines between stroke, shadow, scar, and sex.

The combination of the material, the technique of interlocking loops, and the highly graphic figuration places the work simultaneously in the rich tradition of painting, the lineage of expressive textiles spanning distant history to the present, and early 2-D pixel based video games. The Bayeux Tapestry comes to mind, as do early Venus figures, Super Mario circa 1983, and the mittens my first grade teacher, Mrs. Heddendorf, crocheted for every one of her pupils.

The rich history of such work runs deep and nods to the conservative values of Virginia Beach, where Chandler was born and raised, by explicitly placing a representation of non-normative gender into a medium associated with a women’s handicraft akin to warmth, comfort, and safety.

A direct comparison to Cézanne’s bather’s illuminates an important position from which Chandler works. Cézanne’s subjects mostly lounge in the nude, posed to accept our gaze, with only a few caught in motion, either wading or floating. Cézanne’s push toward an atypical figuration was a transgressive, challenging gesture given the time, but his female subject’s passivity reinforce a consistent theme throughout art history.

In contrast, Chandler’s character’s effusive happiness, and in some cases, superhuman abilities (they defy gravity!), displace gender archetypes and speak to the artist’s worldview, which he succinctly stated in an interview with Katherine Bradford, published by The Color Hour:

“The underlying thesis of my work explores and affirms queerness as the normative state. Choosing the life affirming positive choice is radical. That’s the kind of feminism that resonates with me.”

Beach Bois is a solo exhibition of new, site-specific work by Caroline Wells Chandler. Taking The Large Bathers by Paul Cézanne (a local treasure at the Philadelphia Museum of Art) as a jumping off point, Chandler has produced a new series of figures which he describes as Queer Bathers.

These Queer Bathers, hand crocheted by the artist in wool, depict joyful, larger-than-life swimming figures in mid-stroke. Their colorful bodies, smiling faces, and stretching arms emerge from water while their midsections and kicking legs remain immersed and refracted. Their graphic rendering emphasizes select details, like the double mastectomy FTM top surgery scars shown in luminous hues, which speak to a consistent theme of non-conformity within Chandler’s work, the literal blurring of lines between stroke, shadow, scar, and sex.

The combination of the material, the technique of interlocking loops, and the highly graphic figuration places the work simultaneously in the rich tradition of painting, the lineage of expressive textiles spanning distant history to the present, and early 2-D pixel based video games. The Bayeux Tapestry comes to mind, as do early Venus figures, Super Mario circa 1983, and the mittens my first grade teacher, Mrs. Heddendorf, crocheted for every one of her pupils.

The rich history of such work runs deep and nods to the conservative values of Virginia Beach, where Chandler was born and raised, by explicitly placing a representation of non-normative gender into a medium associated with a women’s handicraft akin to warmth, comfort, and safety.

A direct comparison to Cézanne’s bather’s illuminates an important position from which Chandler works. Cézanne’s subjects mostly lounge in the nude, posed to accept our gaze, with only a few caught in motion, either wading or floating. Cézanne’s push toward an atypical figuration was a transgressive, challenging gesture given the time, but his female subject’s passivity reinforce a consistent theme throughout art history.

In contrast, Chandler’s character’s effusive happiness, and in some cases, superhuman abilities (they defy gravity!), displace gender archetypes and speak to the artist’s worldview, which he succinctly stated in an interview with Katherine Bradford, published by The Color Hour:

“The underlying thesis of my work explores and affirms queerness as the normative state. Choosing the life affirming positive choice is radical. That’s the kind of feminism that resonates with me.”

Caroline Wells Chandler (b. 1985, Norfolk, VA) lives and works in New York. Chandler received his MFA in Painting and Printmaking from the School of Art at Yale University and his BFA from Southern Methodist University in Dallas, Texas. Recent exhibitions include The Best Little Whore House in Texas at Roberto Paradise, San Juan, Puerto Rico, Queering the Lines at Art League Houston, Houston, Texas, and Homunculus at Field Projects, New York. He will have work in Imagine, a forthcoming group show at Brand New Gallery in Milan, Italy.
carolinewellschandler.com

Background

Modern Painters
The Color Hour