"The Body in Question" is a group exhibition curated by painter Ophir Agassi and critic Karen Wilkin running from November 30 - December 31, 2021.

The human figure has long been a compelling subject for painters and sculptors. In the history of Western art, the ability of trained artists was once measured by how convincingly they were able to render the human form. Modernism’s rebellion rejected this high value placed on the figure itself and it's realistic depiction. The artists featured in "The Body in Question" answer, "Why paint the figure today?" Although stylistically diverse, they all share a belief in the history of art as a continuum, in the eloquence of the recognizable image, and in the expressive potency of color. Each artist has a distinct point of view of what place the human figure holds in Contemporary Art. Jeremy Long and Rachel Rickert take on the challenge of translating intense perception of everyday, contemporary actuality into the fiction of paint on a flat surface, using quotidian happenings as starting points for expressive invention. William Bailey’s and Graham Nickson’s work is similarly rooted in real experience, but translates that experience into near-abstract constructions that evoke specific places, enacted by figures who at once refer to the familiar present and the past. Enrico Riley draws on specific practices and events, filtering them through the history of art as well as his own history. Matthew Blackwell and Janice Nowinski allude freely to the figure, constructing ambiguous narratives enlivened by the tension between the fact of paint and the will of the artist, walking a tightrope between apparent artlessness and sophistication. Kyle Staver confronts history painting’s traditional subject matter, staging myths from a highly individual, feminist-inflected, contemporary viewpoint. Clintel Steed conjures up suggestions of past and present from dense pigment that threatens to subsume his images. Alun Williams offers us characters that simultaneously affirm and make us question the significance of the figure both now and throughout the history of art. All ten artists use figurative and human forms to represent an intellectual position; as symbols of a social or political view; or as a personal expression that can only be understood with the presence of the figure in the picture. This work not only bears witness to the continued relevance of the figure, formally and conceptually, but it also raises engaging questions about present and future. This exhibition would not have been possible without the support from the Wolf Kahn and Emily Mason Foundation.