I’m delighted to be invited to be the first official artist-in-residence at hotel Selina, Playa del Carmen. I began the residency directly after the Christmas and New Year holiday period on January 7th and it will run until the end of the month. My main goals for the residency are to help facilitate the bringing together of local and visiting artists and creatives and LGBTQ+ people in a safe and supportive space. I’ll be holding three events during the residency, the first an art salon taking place on Thursday January 16th (information here), then a presentation of my work on Thursday January 23rd and finally a little (Br)exit party to mark the end of the residency on Saturday February 2nd (I’ll then be headed to Mexico City for Zona Maco, the largest Latin American art fair). More details to come.
Interview with Beyond Photography
I was interviewed by the good folk of Beyond Photography and you can see the full interview online via this link with an excerpt below.
"Talk to us about your Ouroboros series, what is the process?"
The Ouroboros sculpture was originally a commission but I expanded it into something bigger. It begins with the model and the 3D scan and for this work I had originally intended to use a single model but at the last minute he dropped out so, working with a specialist in 3D scanning and modelling, we actually composited together three different models.
I see 3D scanning as the next logical step in photography; if you consider analogue photography as 1.0, digital photography as 2.0, and 3D scanning as 3.0, and instead of having a 2D flat image that you can manipulate, you have a 3D model you can manipulate. Once I have that model, as in photography, I’ll choose how I want to execute the work. In this instance I’ve cast it in various sizes and materials like bronze or stainless steel using traditional lost- wax casting which is a method of casing that hasn’t really changed in six thousand years.
"That's a brilliant way to describe photography's transition into 3d. Your Ouroboros series is created digitally, but then executed as a sculpture, and your photography is heavily shot on film. Can you tell us about being an artist that uses both digital and more traditional methods?"
The sculptures can take many months and sometimes years to come together and so, especially in the case of Polaroid film, I like to be able to produce a work instantly, something tangible that I can in front of me right now. Also, in an ongoing series I started last year, I began to psychically cut the Polaroids and reassemble them and I see this almost as a form of “immediate sculpture”. I also love that once that cut is executed then there’s no going back.
Adlocutio (Sean Ford), 2020 - a new statue
The first iteration of two new statues working with the model and adult actor Sean Ford is now ready and I’m thrilled to present it. Building on my Sebastian series and referencing selfie culture, hookup apps, and the idea of ‘influencers’ and ‘followers’, Adlocutio (Sean Ford) is a new statue to be released early 2020 created using 3D scanning and sculpting technologies and working with the adult actor and model Sean Ford.
“In ancient Rome the Latin word adlocutio means an address given by a general, usually the emperor, to his massed army and legions, and a general form of Roman salute from the army to their leader. The adlocutio is one of the most widely represented formulas of Roman art” - from Wikipedia.
More, much more, to follow.
Ouroboros (formation), 2019 - limited edition print collaboration with Double Happiness Projects
I’ve recently collaborated with Jeremy Tseng of Double Happiness Projects (an alternative art space based in Toronto's gallery district), to produce a new limited edition print of my Ouroboros sculpture which can be purchased directly from them online here. Presented on the occasion of Art Toronto and Edition Toronto, the print depicts the formation of the sculpture using 3D scanning and sculpting technologies and is a limited edition of 50, 8 x 8 in / 20 x 20 cm. This is my first collaboration of this type and it's been a great process.
Ouroboros (formation), 2019
Digital Sebastian (relic) via Seditionart.com
A limited edition digital version of my bronze Sebastian (relic) with verdigris urine patina is now available via seditionart.com in an edition of 50. The work was created by 3D scanning the actual bronze piece following its unearthing after 6 months in the ground at the Tom of Finland Foundation in Los Angeles where visitors were encouraged to urinate on the spot where the bronze head was buried. The uric acid in the urine reacts with the copper in the bronze creating a blue/green patina. More info and purchase the work via this link.
Sebastian (relic), 2019, digital edition of 50
Interview with Mexico City/LA-based The Guest Magazine
I sat down with the The Guest Magazine to talk about my work whilst in Mexico City back in May. Here’s the interview in full and some lovely portraits of me and a small Ouroboros maquette.
Stuart Sandford Portfolio 2: Cumfaces
In 2010 I released my first portfolio, titled Stuart Sandford 1: 2004-2007, which collected 12 photographic works executed between 2004-2007. I always intended it to be the first in a series of portfolios but never quite got around to making the second one, until now that is.
I'm happy to present Stuart Sandford 2: Cumfaces, a limited edition (of 25) portfolio of 12 photographic works presented in a gold embossed archival clamshell box collecting my 2007 series Cumfaces. This series has been published and exhibited widely (most recently at Centre de la Photographie, Geneva and The Ravestijn Gallery, Amsterdam) and is the first iteration of the 'selfie' within my work that would directly lead to my Sebastian statue series.
The portfolio is now available for pre-order via this link and will be published October 14th with a pre-order price of $1,000 (plus shipping/handling). There are also 4 of the Stuart Sandford 1 portfolios still remaining which can be purchased here.
My third portfolio, yes you guessed it, Stuart Sandford 3, will be published late spring 2020 and will consist of 12 works from my new series of Polaroid Collages. More details to follow.
Cumfaces #1-12, 2007
Sebastian - augmented reality Snapchat filter
I made this Snapchat filter back in 2017 and it’s been lots of fun seeing what people have done with it around the world. Here’s the Snap code for those who want to have some fun with it and some examples of the filters that folk have sent me. Many thanks to all who took the time to install it and send me videos and screenshots. More to come!
Sebastian (relic) no.1, 2016-2019, cast bronze with verdigris (urine) patina
I’ve just completed work on the latest edition of one of my bronze relic sculptures from my ongoing Sebastian series and it’s now on view at Childs Gallery, Boston. Sebastian (relic) no.1, 2016-2019, cast bronze with verdigris (urine) patina, forms part of Out-Spoken: Fifty Years of Pride which runs through August 18th.
Referencing both Warhol and Picasso, the bronze head was buried for 6 months in the garden of Tom of Finland Foundation in Los Angeles and visitors were asked to urinate on the head. The uric acid within the urine reacts with the copper in the bronze prematurely ageing it and turning it a blue-green. The work was commissioned for a private collection and it’s rumoured that the Romans would utilise this same method, albeit with slave boys, to achieve a look that was akin to their beloved Greek bronzes. Thank you to all those involved for contributing and helping to make this work happen.
OSMOSCOSMOS - opening night and installation views
A selection of opening night photographs and installation views of my work and others (including Water Pfeiffer, Thomas Ruff, and Nobuyoshi Araki) as part of OSMOSCOSMOS running until August 25th at the Centre de la Photographie, Geneva.
50JPG - OSMOSCOSMOS - Centre de la Photographie, Geneva - opening reception June 18th 2019
Thrilled to take part in this HUGE museum show with over 100 incredible artists from around the world where I’ll be showing a new iteration of my Cumfaces from 2007. I’ll be there for the reception which is June 18th. Info below.
Cumfaces #1-12, 2007
On the occasion of our 6th edition of the triennial 50JPG (50 Days for Photography in Geneva), come and celebrate with us the opening of OSMOSCOSMOS
The main exhibition will attempt to bring together Eros & Cosmos. Under the title OSMOSCOSMOS, it will highlight the link between these two worlds.
Curator Joerg Bader
Co-curator Alexandra Schüssler
WITH THE PARTICIPATION OF MORE THAN 100 ARTISTS INCLUDING : NOBUYOSHI ARAKI, RENATE BERTLMANN, NICOLAS CRISPINI, MAURICIO DIAS & WALTER RIEDWEG, CHARLES & RAY EAMES, HANS-PETER FELDMANN, SYLVIE FLEURY, PIERRE KELLER, ARMIN LINKE, LEE LOZANO, URS LÜTHI, MANON, SUSAN MEISELAS, BJØRN MELHUS, BORIS MIKHAILOV , GIANNI MOTTI, JEAN-LUC MOULÈNE, PETER PILLER, WALTER PFEIFFER, THOMAS RUFF, GREGOR SAILER, VIVIANE SASSEN, LINA SCHEYNIUS, JO SPENCE, JULES SPINATSCH, GRAZIA TODERI & ORHAN PAMUK, PATRICK TOSANI, CHRISTIAN WALDVOGEL… AND MANY MORE
www.50jpg.ch
www.centrephotogeneve.ch/expo/osmoscosmos/
EXHIBITION
19.06.2019 - 25.08.2019
OPENING
18.06.2019 dès 18:00
The Body Is The Instrument - opening reception and installation views
An absolutely HUGE thank you to everyone who came out Wednesday May 8th to support the opening of The Body Is The Instrument. There were over 250 people in attendance and it was wonderful to see so many friendly faces. Attached below are a selection of installation shots and photographs from the opening reception, thanks to Phuc Le and Maxwell Poth for their contributions here. The benefit exhibition and auction run through May 31st by appointment at TOM House (please call them for a viewing time on 213-250-1685) and online via Paddle8.
The Body Is The Instrument - bid now
The Body Is The instrument auction via Paddle8 goes live 12 noon PST today May 8th and runs until 12 noon PST May 31st. Happy bidding! https://paddle8.com/auction/tom-of-finland
The Body Is The Instrument - A benefit exhibition for Tom of Finland Foundation - May 8th through May 31st 2019
Stuart Sandford, in conjunction with Dr. Evan Goldstein of Bespoke Surgical, is pleased to announce a benefit exhibition at TOM House in Los Angeles titled The Body Is The Instrument, from May 8th through May 31st 2019, and online via Paddle8.
Curated by Stuart Sandford, The Body Is The Instrument focuses on the interconnection between art, sex, and science, and presents a group of emerging, established, and influential queer artists working with the male form across multiple disciplines, including photography, sculpture, painting, moving image, and collage. The exhibition opening reception coincides with the birthday of Tom of Finland (born Touko Laaksonen), whose libidinal foresight impacted gay culture around the world and transcended pornography to become fine art. Coming together with Dr. Evan Goldstein was a natural fit as his focus at Bespoke Surgical is not only the intersection of sex and science, but also treating the ass as a work of art. The exhibition will benefit the Tom of Finland Foundation, a nonprofit 501(c)(3) Educational Archive.
Participating artists (in alphabetical order):
Mark Beard
Adam Chuck
Gabe Cortese
Rubén Esparza
Gio Black Peter
Simon Haas
Brandon Herman
Florian Hetz
David Hockney
Terence Koh
Matt Lambert
Tom of Finland
Jwan Yosef
Stuart Sandford is an artist and independent curator from the UK currently based in Los Angeles. He has exhibited and published his work internationally and has curated and co-curated exhibitions in Los Angeles and London.
Tom of Finland Foundation was established in 1984 by Durk Dehner and his friend Touko Laaksonen a.k.a. Tom of Finland. As Tom had established worldwide recognition as the master of homo-erotic art, the Foundation's original purpose was to preserve his vast catalog of work. Several years later the scope was widened to offer a safe haven for all erotic art in response to rampant discrimination against art that portrayed sexual behavior or generated a sexual response. Today the Foundation continues in its efforts of educating the public as to the cultural merits of erotic art and in promoting healthier, more tolerant attitudes about sexuality.
Dr. Evan Goldstein is the Founder and CEO of Bespoke Surgical, the leading private practice specializing in an elite standard of sexual health and wellness care for the modern gay male. As the preeminent leader in the field and with offices in both New York and Beverly Hills, Dr. Goldstein offers concierge-style medical and surgical expertise to the gay community and is dedicated to not only bringing the important issues surrounding gay sexual health to the forefront, but also eliminating stigmas around gay sexuality.
To RSVP to the opening night: rsvpthebody@gmail.com
For all press enquires: holly@mmlpr.com
For event/sponsorship enquiries: glam@bespokesurgical.com
Poster design by Rubén Esparza, artwork by Florian Hetz
Boys! Boys! Boys! Volume 4 - Spring and weekend presentation in Amsterdam
Boys! Boys! Boys! is a weekend presentation at The Ravestijn Gallery in Amsterdam, The Netherlands supporting the 4th edition of the Paddle 8 auction of the same name which is now live (running from March 15th to 28th). Artists in this iteration include AdeY, Lulu Delafalaise, Digo Duarte, Thibault Gaetan Dubroca, Stephane Gizard, Greg Gorman, Phil Griffin, Alexandre Haefeli, Brandon Herman, Florian Hetz, Iakovos, Steven Klein, Richard Kranzin, Matt Lambert, Serge Le Hidalgo, Will McBride, Manuel Moncayo, Lucas Murnaghan, Ferry van der Nat, Laurence Philomene, Howard Roffman, John Patrick Salisbury, Xavier Samre, Stuart Sandford, Ruben van Schalm, Luke Smithers, Michael Sondergaard, Birk Thomassen, Bruce Weber, Andy Warhol, Sarp Kerem Yavuz, and Vlad Zorin.
Jake (iv), 2016, C-type print, part of the Paddle 8 Boys! Boys! Boys! auction
Circus of Books - group exhibition at FIERMAN in New York - March 16th through May 5th 2019
Delighted to be part of Circus of Books running from March 16th - May 5th at FIERMAN in New York, a group exhibition celebrating the legendary Los Angeles bookstores. A zine by Billy Miller from Straight To Hell will be released to mark the occasion and the exhibition is co-curated by artist Rachel Mason, whose documentary Circus of Books has its premiere at the same time at the Tribeca Film Festival.
I’m showing a triptych of Polaroids (detail below) taken at the WeHo branch of CoB back in 2016 and please take a look at the flyer above for the amazing list of artists involved.
Hustler (triptych), 2016 - detail
Sebastian (relic) no.1 - call for contributions at Tom of Finland Foundation
Buried beneath this tree at TOM House in Echo Park, Los Angeles, CA is a cast bronze ‘relic’ from my ongoing Sebastian series. To create an ancient looking blue/green (known as verdigris) patina, please urinate on this spot. The uric acid in the urine reacts with the metal, prematurely aging it. Thank you for your contribution.
Press for Adults Only - running through March 9th 2019
There’s been some great press so far for Adults Only, the group exhibition I’m showing my 2007 Cumfaces series in that opened January 18th at Galerie Biesenbach in Cologne, Germany and runs through March 9th. Check below for articles from Liberation (French), Art Critique (French), and Kölnische Rundschau newspaper (German).
Adults Only - group exhibition in Cologne, Germany - January 18th through March 3rd 2019
From delicate to hard, from painting, drawing and collage to photography and sculpture to installation, the works that are shown in ADULTS ONLY pick up and depict themes from erotic to pornographic.
The focus of ADULTS ONLY, the first group exhibition at Biesenbach Gallery in 2019, is a subject that could hardly be more human: the sensual body that has always fascinated its viewers. The artistic composition of the artworks reflects abysses and highlights of human sexuality and offers a journey through the current art scene, whose protagonists dedicate themselves in their presented works to the subject of sex.
Time and time again, the human body and its various ways of erotizing were and are being rediscovered and specifically charged for art. It was not only postmodernism that drew on Greek high art and Roman antiquity with its dramatic erotic motifs.
The works of our 10 contemporary artists in ADULTS ONLY tell a story of sex and sensuality in the history of human culture. The exhibition, which does not shy away from potentially objectionable footage, also assumes a certain explosiveness.
Sometimes the body is self-sufficient, resting, sometimes it is intertwined in the act of love, at times it even flares itself up to masturbation. The series “Cumfaces” by British photographer and filmmaker Stuart Sandford (*1978, lives and works in Los Angeles and London) shows exactly this: faces of young men at the moment of the self-induced climax.
Pornographic films serve French artist Rebecca Bournigault (*1970 in Colmar, lives and works in Paris) as a model for her sexually explicit watercolours, in which she portrays women – released from the original film setting – and thus stimulates reflection on the exploitation of the female body today.
With his photo series "STOFF, HAUT, BLICK" (“FABRIC, SKIN, GAZE”), Cologne-based artist Roland Schappert (*1965) takes up motifs from porn magazines and zooms almost voyeuristically in on detailed boundaries between garments and bodies. This suggests more or less clear individual moments and social situations. His photographs were originally shown in an exhibition project together with works by Stefan Römer at high-end fashion store città di bologna in Cologne in 1998. Digitalised/remastered for our “Adults Only” exhibition, Schappert’s photographs are reinterpreted for the first time as lightfast prints on Alu Dibond (edition of 8 copies each). In addition and in line with the exhibition’s midissage on 16 February, at 6 pm, the artist will present a performance of his own "SEXROMAN", a novel also published in 1998.
Back to the ancient Greek origin of the term "pornography" - derived and composed of πόρνη (pórnē, "prostitute") and γράφειν (gráphein, "write") - brings us Hamburg-based artist Viviane Gernaert (*1976 in Munich) with her interpretation of a “Kober” window: Only the prostitute is missing from her re-enactment of a brothel in the window of the gallery. Furthermore, her graphite drawings, based on David Lynch’s “Blue Velvet”, explore a somewhat different kind of voyeurism than her “Kober” window.
Voyeurism plays a major role in the work of Dutch painter Jans Muskee(*1961 in Nieuw-Amsterdam, lives and works in Groningen). His oil pastels on paper show scenes, all life-size and lifelike, with adults only – or for adults only – who are entangled in bizarre constellations. Muskee ironically exposes the uptight concept of a morally intact suburb as a world of Sodom and Gomorrah.
The conservative sexual fantasies of the 1950s are targeted by German sculptor and painter Beate Höing (*1966, lives and works in Coesfeld). The artist uses nude nymph figures made of porcelain in her fragile sculptures of clay and other findings from porcelain and appropriates their delicate and naive eroticism in several firing processes.
Parisian artist Julien Comte-Gaz (*1987 in Australia) uses old (soft) pornographic photographs – sometimes dating back as far as to the 1920’s – and robs them of their "offensiveness" by delicately applied dot-drawings, pixel-like collages or meticulous lasercuts (as for example in his reappropriated Bunnies from the Playboys of the 1970/80s), therefore covering all sexual matters or simply cutting them out.
The tender-harmless, playful eroticism that emanates from Höing's nymphs and also shows through in Comte-Gaz's works, stands in stark contrast to Matt Lambert's sometimes very explicit photographs and films that have nothing in common with obsolete moral concepts. His work is an often hard-core, sex-infused and unapologetic celebration of gay sexuality. The Berlin-based artist (*1983 in Los Angeles), who has also worked for nearly all major fashion and lifestyle magazines, is best known for his LGBT community-related work. Lambert prefers to work with real porn actors and deals with topics such as youth and intimacy.
Also queer related is American Tom Bianchi’s photographic work, who devotes himself entirely to the act of men in his work. In more than 20 books with photographs, poems and essays already published, experiences of homosexual men are treated. The Polaroid series shown in ADULTS ONLY was originally created between 1975-83 (Bianchi was born in 1945, he lives and works in Palm Springs) and pays homage to the carefree, pre-AIDS lifestyle of the gay community at Fire Island Pines, Long Island, NY.
In his work, British photographer Bob Carlos Clarke, who died in 2006 and is also known as the British Helmut Newton, dedicates himself to the nude act as well, but this time around the female one. Clarke realizes erotic (male) fantasies and works with models, actresses and stars (the exhibition shows, for example, Academy Award winner Rachel Weizs in “For Dolls That Do Dishes”). His work, published in countless books and magazines, is synonymous with glamour, fetish and women's bodies.
Pleasure Park, 2018
I made this short film earlier in the year, a love letter to the place and the people of Tom of Finland Foundation, my home in Los Angeles for the past three years.