Quay Quinn Wolf at interface gallery

Artist: Quay Quinn Wolf

Exhibition title: Pink Velvet Dress with the Fur Collar

Venue: interface gallery, Oakland, California, US

Date: August 16 – September 29, 2019

Photography: all images copyright and courtesy of the artist and Interface, Oakland

Interface is pleased to present Pink Velvet Dress with the Fur Collar, a solo exhibition by Quay Quinn Wolf. Wolf presents objects in ways that evoke memories and the ephemerality of experience. He often uses materials that adorn or augment the body such as hair gels, oils, velvet, satin, clothing, and flowers, to suggest the body and its transience.

For this exhibition, Wolf presents an installation of new sculptures exploring his relationship to his grandmother and reflecting on her relationship to 1950’s cinema, specifically Douglas Sirk’s Imitation of Life (1959), which Wolf remembers watching with her.

Sirk’s film is a tale of two single mothers, one white, and the other black. Wolf has memories of his grandmother’s comments during the film as she would imagine the black domestic characters adorned in the opulent garments the white female characters wore. In this exhibition, furs and velvet are draped on canes and c-stands respectively, evoking themes of desire, aging and representation. A central sculpture is entitled, “I adored that velvet dress,” which references a comment Wolf’s grandmother made about a dress worn by the white main character, Lora (played by Lana Turner).

Other titles are drawn from scenes in the film. For example, “I am white, I’m as white as Susie!,” references a painful scene in which the little girl, Sarah Jane (played by Sandra Dee), who passes for white, expresses confusion and dismay at being identified as a “negro child.” The piece is made of white silk, crushed African red roses and Shea oil, resulting in a stained surface that simultaneously suggests violence, bruising and the domestic labor of the black characters in the film.

Collectively, the works consider Wolf’s grandmother’s own longing and desire as expressed through her response to the film. As such, they reflect in a very personal way, on class and racial divides that continue today.

Quay Quinn Wolf, Pink Velvet Dress with the Fur Collar, 2019, exhibition view, Interface, Oakland

Quay Quinn Wolf, “I am white, I’m as white as Susie!”, 2019. Upholstered cream silk stained with African red roses, Shea oil

Quay Quinn Wolf, Dreaming of Luxury no.4, 2019. Vintage mink fur stole in custom PVC bag, four-prong cane

Quay Quinn Wolf, Dreaming of Luxury no.4, 2019, detail. Vintage mink fur stole in custom PVC bag, four-prong cane

Quay Quinn Wolf, Dreaming of luxury no.3, 2019. Vintage mink collar in custom PVC bag, four-prong cane

Quay Quinn Wolf, Dreaming of luxury no.3, 2019, detail. Vintage mink collar in custom PVC bag, four-prong cane

Quay Quinn Wolf, “I adored that velvet dress”, 2019. Pink silk-velvet stained with African red roses and Shea oil, PVC sheet, chrome C-stand

Quay Quinn Wolf, “I adored that velvet dress”, 2019, detail. Pink silk-velvet stained with African red roses and Shea oil, PVC sheet, chrome C-stand