ben maltz gallery

Most of Kenzi Shiokava’s sculptures consist of organic matter, like bark and dragon-tree fronds, combined with found materials, such as chicken wire or brooms. In Untitled (Urban Totem Series), 2000, an upright railroad tie narrows into two sharp prongs at the top. Of a similar shape, Untitled (Urban Totem Series), 2005, was carved from a discarded telephone pole. Each sculpture resembles a statuesque humanoid form.

In her 1994 book The Body in Pieces: The Fragment as a Metaphor of Modernity, the late art historian Linda Nochlin analogized representations of the disintegrated figure to tumultuous moments in the modern period’s political and metaphysical flux. While she linked some examples to the era’s chaotic break from antique notions of unification and permanence, Nochlin argued that others gestured to literal experiences of violence by communities under assault.