Impulsive/Decisive: Works from the O’Neill Collection

A few install shots of Impulsive/Decisive: Works from the O’Neill Collection on view now at the Urban Institute for Contemporary Art in Grand Rapids, Michigan. The exhibition features two of my sculptural works, a maquette of Ouroboros, 2019, and a miniature version of the Sebastian (relic) no.1 in Yves Klein blue.

FEATURING WORK BY:

Adam Chuck, Allison Long Hardy, Andy Warhol, Armin Hofmann, Brandt Brinkerhoff and Katherine Walker, Brian Thomas McQueen, Carson Davis Brown, Christy DeHoog, Chuck Anderson, Cornel Windlin, Daniel Marin Medina, Harry Anderson, Hedi Slimane, Jason Murray, Jeremy Chandler, Jerrad Matthew, Jessica Joy, Joey Ruiter, Karlo Martinez, Kelly Allen, Krista Connerly, Mandy Cano Villalobos, Marjan Lulgjuraj, Mark Shepard, Martin Venezky, Matthew Schenk, Meridith Ridl, Michael Schaeffer, Michael-Birch Pierce, Saul Gray-Hildenbrand, Stuart Sandford, Tim Carpenter, Tom Bianchi, Tommy Allen, Troy Michie, Wolfgang Weingart, and Yinka Shonibare.

Adlocutio (Sean Ford) - The making of book

The making of
Adlocutio (Sean Ford)
2022
44 pages, colour, offset print, perfect bound
Edition of 250
Signed and numbered
Standard edition $25
Special edition $250 (edition of 50 with signed and numbered print)
PRE-ORDER HERE
(PLEASE NOTE: special edition version will with print only be available until the publication date of May 9th)

Limited edition artists book detailing the making of the life size bronze Adlocutio (Sean Ford) sculpture from conception to finished work, a three year process. Available as a standard edition and a limited edition (of 50) with 12 x 9 in / 30.4 x 22.8 cm signed and numbered archival pigment print (printed on Hahnemühle Photo Rag paper).

"AllTogether" - A Group Exhibition - Venice & Paris

On the occasion of Tom of Finland’s birthday (8th May), Tom of Finland Foundation and The Community have curated a group exhibition, supported by Diesel, presenting Tom of Finland Foundation’s permanent collection.

AllTogether explores the erotic art collection consisting of thousands of artworks, spanning multiple decades and encompassing all media and techniques. This exhibition is possible because of the Foundation’s efforts in preserving the work of Queer artists, many of whom have faced discrimination and misrepresentation due to the nature of what they create.

For thirty-seven years, Tom of Finland Foundation has been building the world’s most extensive collection of LGBTQ+ art. The diverse curation of this show highlights the stories of over seventy featured artists and comprises more than two hundred works of art from the 1940s to the present day.

The opening in Venice coincides with the first weekend of the Venice Biennale and the opening in Paris celebrates Tom’s birth date. A fully illustrated catalogue has been published.

Artists

J. EPSTEIN, AL URBAN, ANDRE, ANNIE SPRINKLE, ATTILA RICHARD LUKACS, AURÉLIEN NOBÉCOURT-ARRAS, BASTILLE, BENÔIT PRÉVOT, BOB MIZER, BRUCE RAPP, CARRINGTON GALEN, CHRIS JOHNSON, DAVE PIBEL, DOMINO, DON BACHARDY, E.M.A. STUDIO, EMMA KOHLMANN, ETIENNE, FLORIAN HETZ, GEORGE QUAINTANCE, GIO BLACK PETER, GOH MISHIMA, GREGORY MASKWA, HEATHER BENJAMIN, HECTOR SILVA, HIROSHI SHIMOYAMA, JAY JORGENSEN, JEAN FERRARO, JESS SCOTT, JIM FRENCH, JIM SHAW, JOHN WATERS, JOHNNY SMITH, KENNY KNUTSON, KENNETH ANGER, LINK, MARCEL ALCALÁ, MARCELLO LUPETTI, MATT LAMBERT, MICHAEL KIRWAN, MICHAEL REYNOLDS & MARTYN THOMPSON, MICHEL LAGUERRE, MIGUEL ANGEL REYES, MIKE KUCHAR, MINORU, MR GRUTS, NIGEL KENT, OLAF, ORSEN, PALANCA, PATRICK LEE, PETER BERLIN, PHILIP CORE, PHUC LE, R. DANIEL FOSTER, REX, RICK CASTRO, RINALDO HOPF, ROB CLARKE, SAL SALANDRA, SETH BOGART, SHEREE ROSE, SILVIA PRADA, SIMON HAAS, SLAVA MOGUTIN, STANLEY STELLAR, STEVEN REIGNS, STUART SANDFORD, SULTAN, SUSANNA LUOTO, SUZANNE SHIFFLETT, TANK, TEDDY OF PARIS, THE HUN, TOM OF FINLAND, VALENTINE, VICTOR ARIMONDI, VIKTORIA RAYKOVA, and XAVIER GICQUEL.

AllTogether sets out to convey the individual stories of the artists. At the same time, the exhibition locates parallels, interactions, and influences between Tom of Finland Foundation, Tom’s aesthetic impact, and the community of artists that have formed throughout the years around them. The selection of works considers and shows the treatment of sexuality throughout decades: from the years of censorship, the sexual revolution, the subsequent HIV/AIDS epidemic, and the explosion of information – the expressions have varied between hypermasculine TOM’s Men and dandyish self assertiveness and the motifs featured orgiastic celebration and diabolical queerness. The exhibition also highlights the historical context and the queer experience from midcentury to today, where erotic arts, the intimate encounter of art and pornography, is still navigating between the art world and gay subcultures. In AllTogether, the love of freedom transcends gender and sexuality and allows the elevation of the erotic to high art. – Sini Rinne-Kanto, Curator of The Community

More info via The Community website.

Cast in Bronze: Figurative Sculpture from the 20th and 21st Centuries

I’m participating in an online only exhibition with Childs Gallery in Boston presented via Artsy. Cast in Bronze: Figurative Sculpture from the 20th and 21st Centuries presents a selection of fine figurative bronze sculptures that were created using the ancient process of lost wax casting. Included are maquettes for monumental sculpture as well as intimate and utilitarian objects for the home.

Featuring sculptures by David Aronson, Richmond Barthé, Donald De Lue, Pablo Eduardo, Walker Kirtland Hancock, Anne Lyman Powers, Richard H. Recchia, Stuart Sandford, and Dudley Vaill Talcott, Cast in Bronze is available to view on Artsy, March 22 through April 30, 2022.

Sebastian (relic) no. 1, 2016

Elysian Fields - installation and opening night photos

A few shots from the opening reception for Elysian Fields as well as a number of installation shots, as well as the QR code for those wanting to experience the augmented reality Adlocutio (Sean Ford) and can’t make it to the gallery. The exhibition runs until March 5th.

Elysian Fields - two person exhibition with Juliette Losq at James Freeman Gallery

Super excited to announce that I’m showing my first life-size sculptural work this February in London! All the details in the press release below.

James Freeman Gallery are pleased to present ‘Elysian Fields’, an exhibition about the ever-changing relationship between the physical and the digital, explored through the work of two contemporary artists: Juliette Losq and Stuart Sandford.

Juliette Losq’s watercolour paintings depict man-made environments in the process of decline, semi-industrial sites where human occupation has all but departed and nature is regaining control. The intense labour involved in the creation of Juliette’s expansive paintings contrasts with the abandoned subject matter, as if the physical work that once belonged within these structures had found a new role in documenting their change. Juliette’s use of watercolour is unusual in this respect, as the scale and complexity of the works contrasts with the traditional domestic role of the medium. The unexpected is also a theme in the imagery: there is an implicit presence lurking behind the abundance of detail, an unknown future hovering invisible beyond the decay. In this sense Juliette’s paintings are also imaginative theatres where contrasting forces compete: creation versus dereliction; the tangible versus the imaginary; the visually precise versus the undefined. They describe the uncertain moment where humankind is reevaluating its relationship with the physical world before the seemingly limitless possibilities of digital creation.

Stuart Sandford’s sculptures explore the rapidly shifting distinction between the virtual and physical realms by revisiting the Classical tradition of the ideal human form. Stuart finds the contemporary version of the exemplary in the carefully crafted online self-images that serve as subjects for the gay male gaze. He renders these through 3D scanning to create a digital template of the new archetype, to be then made solid in bronze, marble, and basalt using state-of-the-art sculpturing technologies. A life-size figure of Adlocutio, created with the porn star Sean Ford, depicts an alluring male in white lacquered bronze gazing into his phone as if addressing his adoring his many followers. Stuart’s reworking of the classical myth of the Ouroboros, the snake that eats its tail, interprets this as a tale of self-love taken to its narcissistic extreme. Stuart’s sculptures present an unashamed examination of how conceptual and sexual attraction overlap and suggest our new idealism is rendered in the digital realm.

‘Elysian Fields’ opens on Thursday 10 February 2022, 6:30 – 8:30pm. To receive the PDF preview catalogue of works please register via the link below.

Register for PDF Preview Catalogue

Collaboration with Pâme - collection one - Polaroid Collages

Very excited to share a collaboration with Paris-based Pâme who work with artists to create limited edition 100% crêpe silk scarves and handkerchiefs.

Se pâmer is a french verb, meaning to lose consciousness from an excess of pleasure; to swoon. Used to describe the sensation of being impressed by a work of art, the verb “se pâmer” can also be found in libertine literature to describe the climax of sexual excitement.

The first part of the collection is a selection of works from my ongoing Polaroid Collages series (2018-TBA) and is available now via their website. Individual Polaroid Collages handkerchiefs are an edition of 15 and are 25 x 25 cm. Silk scarves are an edition of 50 and are 90 x 90 cm.

www.cometopame.com/stuart-sandford

Plant Magic residency Spain 11 - 27 September

A month ago I had the pleasure of participating in a short queer art residency last month just outside of Alicante, Spain. Organised by artist Rowland Byass, artists working in different disciplines (including performance, photography, object making, moving image) were invited to share their work, time and ideas, culminating in a presentation of the work created there to mark the end of the residency. Here are some 35mm portraits as well as documentation of the residency and a short video work I produced that was projected over the final weekend. Thank you to Rowland Byass, all the other participating artists, Iker Pérez Cuesta and to Jose Tallon for being a willing Antinous.

Plant Magic artists in residence: Manuel Moncayo; Kashif Namid Chaudry; ReveRso; Stephen Cassandra Eyre; José Carlos G. Aguiar; Ollie Grey; Theophile Calot; Zsorzs Ujvári-Pinté. More about Plant Magic via their Instagram profile.

Closet to Quarantine: Queer and Then and Now - group exhibition in Boston on view now

Closet to Quarantine: Queer Art Then and Now - extended through December 11th

Closet to Quarantine: Queer Art Then and Now connects past and present artistic expressions of queer experience. The exhibition spans the arc of queer history, from taboo, to revolutionary, to accepted and celebrated, featuring works by contemporary LGBTQ+ artists alongside their historical antecedents.

The gallery has long offered works by LGBTQ+ artists, including Richmond Barthé, Paul Cadmus, and Ben Norris, to name just a few. Alongside its other offerings, Childs Gallery has actively cultivated a focus on queer-interest art within its collection. Childs Gallery, established in 1937, and the longest continually operating fine art gallery on Newbury Street, has been wholly or partially gay-owned since 1969.

Installation view

Installation view

Closet to Quarantine: Queer Art Then and Now is inspired by the quarantine-era Instagram account of the gallery’s current owner, Richard Baiano (@artdealerboston). During the Covid-19 quarantine, Baiano posted historical and contemporary art by LGBTQ+ artists under the hashtag #queerartthenandnow as a way to develop a digital community, while also highlighting queer artists throughout history. Discovering artists digitally, through social media, has been an exciting deviation from the gallery’s usual approach. With its low barriers to entry, social media allows artists and audiences to connect more easily, giving access to those who may not otherwise have it, particularly historically marginalized groups like the LGBTQ+ community.

The exhibition runs from September 8th though November 6th. A reception for Closet to Quarantine: Queer Art Then and Now will take place on Saturday, September 18th, 4pm - 7pm.

Artists in the exhibition include:

Hannah Barrett Richmond Barthé Robert Bliss Paul Cadmus Rick Castro Felipe Chavez Opal DeRuvo Rubén Esparza Jared French Andrew Sedgwick Guth Don Joint Mike Kuchar Emily Lombardo Eric Lotzer George Platt Lynes John MacConnell Anthony Moore Ben Norris Stuart Sandford Margaret Rose Vendryes Andy Warhol Sara Zielinski

For more information please visit the gallery website
www.childsgallery.com