TEN.

NAWR • NOW: OH BO***GE! UP YOURS!
Sioned Mason Smith • Seren Morgan Jones • SaeRi Seo • Sue Williams

03-27|06

Launch Friday 5 June 18:00-21:00

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Cyflwyna TEN arddangosfa thematig sy’n cynnwys artistiaid benywaidd sydd â’u gwaith yn dathlu merched a menywod, ac yn gweithredu fel amddiffynfa yn erbyn casineb systemig at fenywod
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TEN presents a thematic exhibition featuring female artists whose work serves as both a celebration of girls and women, and as a bulwark against systemic misogyny

The concept was born from outrage at the bombardment of news documenting despicable violence toward girls and women and the continued landscape of gender-based prejudice. From the harrowing case of Gisèle Pelicot and the Epstein legacy to the toxic influence of the ‘Manosphere’ - in a time of devastating headlines and rise of anti-women rhetoric, the work of the artists involved serve as urgent, creative resistance. Whether knee-jerk or meditative, explicit or inherent to their methodology, each artist asserts a position that is fundamentally defiant and feminist

Sioned Mason Smith explores the symbol of a Welsh Love spoon as a motif within her practice. The Love spoon is a folk craft which has now become a Welsh trope - something signifying a distinctive Welsh tradition, but now inhabits souvenir and tourist shops. She drags them back into relevance by injecting them with modern perspectives, values and aesthetics. By incorporating bodily forms within this tradition, she sees it as a questioning of our presumptions and expectations surrounding what is an accepting token of love

Women are a central theme in Seren Morgan Jones’s work and her sole subjects. She creates images using elements of classical painterly language, with a contemporary, feminist twist while expanding the scope of traditional portraiture

Ceramicist SaeRi Seo explores 'Good Child Syndrome' rooted in her traditional Korean Confucian upbringing and gender-based expectations. By deconstructing the Moon Jar - a symbol of perfection and virtue and, traditionally, a form for male makers only - she liberates herself from past constraints, visualising the internal conflict between societal pressure and individual identity

Sue Williams explores and challenge the fantasies of feminism, sexuality, gender and culture in her work. In doing so she offers her passionate and direct response to the experiences of being a woman - the ups and downs of erotic experiences, memories, family issues and commentary on life in the 21st century

The title of the exhibition is taken from the English punk rock hit by X-Ray Specs, released in 1977. Raw, roaring and raging in it’s relentlessness, the song’s anti-consumerism message became a feminist punk anthem, propelled by front-woman Poly Styrene’s idiosyncratic delivery: a visceral blend of melodic singing and urgent proclamation, dotted with wails and shrieks - a rallying cry for liberation, rebellion and freedom. The track’s urgent appeal became an adopted anthem to all who look to dismantle the structural bo***ge of societal norms, racial injustice and patriarchal oppression

Fervently punk, positively anti-patriarchy and pro-girls, this exhibition is rage-filled, quiet-resolute and confident protest against the grim carnage around us

Sue williams-nomorepink Seren Morgan Jones