The built-up grey structures of Rhubaba gallery, accompanied by a faint hum of voices, creates an atmosphere of importance and reflection. This feeling is infused within every piece displayed at the recently-opened Only Nothing exhibition which aims to open attendees’ eyes to labour in art, especially the struggle of women and their community within the art institution.
The message is amplified through every meticulous detail; each display is built using a grey structure to symbolise the labour that sustains art, whilst also commenting on the feminisation of that labour. Every artist included uses their experiences and observations to communicate the internationally historic inequality of women in the workforce.
A variety of mediums are used. The most poignant pieces are the short films that present the struggle of women in art which best achieve a powerful sense of personalisation and intimacy. Joanna Billing’s Film In Purple tells the story of a group of young female Swedish hip-hop and Afro dancers who are confined to a purple painted cellar. Billing shows the young women carrying purple tinted glass and sharing the burden of its weight, with the video following a cycle to mirror women’s seemingly never-ending struggle in labour.
Another focal point is Natasha A. Kelly’s episodic film Milli’s Awakening which depicts the wave of black feminism in the German art scene. The film reinforces the idea of women in art acting as a community and sharing the burden of unpaid labour as well as conventional gender discrimination. The use of monochrome heightens the dramatic and shocking experiences of German women within the art scenes of Germany.
In its entirety Only Nothing helps to open up wider conversations on art institutions and the feminine art scene. Every piece helps to demonstrate not only the presence of a community of women in art, but also their shared labour in going against patriarchal institutions in the art world. The exhibition ultimately brings these remarkable women, as well has the whole movement for feminine power in art, into the foreground of our understanding of the art world as a whole.
Image: Kitty Golden