Colleen Asper
Arms, Legs, Fingers

May 12  โ€“ June 30 
Opens Sunday 12 May, 6-9PM 

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Arms, Legs, Fingers is a show of three paintings by Colleen Asper and a play in three acts. The paintings offer the artistโ€™s vagina as a stage.
 

Arms is an animated coming-of-age story. Commonly the most dexterous of the limbs, the artistโ€™s arms spring forth from her vagina-turned-stage to play Rosalyn, a young girl not yet marked as woman; her friend and sympathizer Paul; his younger brothers Ryan and Sammy; and the mother of the three boys, who in her proximity and distance to Rosalyn is a modern twist on the evil stepmother. She sets out to teach Rosalyn what it means to be a woman in this stark portrayal of family strife and childhood angst. The ending will leave you stunned. 

Legs follows Lilly, kicking and screaming, from a down-and-out yoga studio into her past. When a chance instruction during vinyasa jogs a memory of a long-lost friendship, Lilly, played by the artistโ€™s left leg, reencounters Jamie, played by the artistโ€™s right leg. The return to her adolescence offers more than Lilly bargained for in this suspenseful meditation on the origins of desire. The ending will leave you speechless. 

Fingers is the final tale in this triumvirate. Twinkle, snap, clap, and cheer for an ensemble cast of all ten of the artistโ€™s digits. Spring break will never be the same after two freshmen drinking in a suburban bathroom learn something about themselves, each other, and finally humanity. What happens next takes us through courtrooms, onto alien spaceships, and right up to current events in order to answer that age-old question, what is in a name? The ending will leave you wanting more. 

If the vulva could speak, what might it say? The answer is not what you expect. Arms, Legs, Fingers will have its performative debut during the May 12th opening at 7:00 and performances will continue on Sundays at 4:00 during the run of the exhibition. When the performances are not scheduled, the paintings, props, and script will be on view.
 

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Colleen Asper has had solo and two person exhibitions at venues that include Stellar Projects, New York, NY (2018); On Stellar Rays, New York, NY (2016); P!, New York, NY (2015); Art Production Fund Lab, New York, NY (2010); and Steven Wolf Fine Arts, San Francisco, CA (2007). Her work has been included in numerous group exhibitions in the United States and abroad, including Galeria Anita Schwartz, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil (2018); The Luminary, St. Louis, Missouri (2017); Art in General, New York, NY (2016); The Drawing Center, New York, NY (2015); Queens Museum, Queens, NY (2015); and The Noyes Museum of Art of Stockton College, Oceanville, NJ (2015). Her work has been reviewed in publications that include Artforum, frieze, Art in America, The New York Times, and The New Yorker. Additionally, she has contributed writing to publications such as Art PracticalThe Brooklyn Rail, Lacanian Ink, and Paper Monument.