Arts > Exhibitions

Reclaiming stereotypes: Mann up

Gallery in The Lanes

20/08/19

Mann Up is an exhibition that focuses on strong social themes wit a veil of irony. The fault of many exhibitions that discuss social themes is that sometimes you leave with a sense of heaviness - feeling like the wold is never actually going to change and that humanity as a species is doomed. While there is nothing wrong with that, it gives Mann Up a point of strength: being able to spark a conversation on social themes while looking at something veiled with irony and visually seductive.
 
Mann Up is a showcase exhibition of textiles, ceramics, photography and sculpture that celebrates gay history through the good and the bad. It is also Mark Mann's first exhibition. Following a degree in Fine Art and Psychology, he worked in a drug an alcohol treatment centre before going to study art education at Cambridge University.

The pieces are inspired by gay icons throughout history, as well as the interior décor of gay couples who are now in their 70s and 80s. At a time when homosexuality was still a crime (it was only decriminalised in the 60s in England), interior design was the only way for homosexual couples to express their identity safely. Throughout the exhibition, the voice is also that of the many gay characters that have made history - whether historical or fictional - such as Hadrian, Ganymede or Oscar Wilde. Each of those characters belong to a distinct historical era that Mann expresses through different aesthetics, each one belonging to a different era. The versatility and the broadness of the themes of the works is probably one of the strongest points of the exhibition, which shows not only in the impressive range of media that Mark has mastered, but also in the different styles. Works that centre around Greek icons have a Greek aesthetic, whereas works that are about Roman emperor Hadrian have a Roman aesthetic. The works about Oscar Wilde have a Victorian aesthetic and some of the works that are more personal to the artist show birds that are typical to Norfolk, where he grew up in. The veil of irony that covers the entire exhibition is given by the way Mann takes stereotypes about gay people and gives them a beautiful form, something to generate pride from the scorn of centuries of oppression.

There is also a slight irony in some of the works, starting from the fact that the exhibition concept was inspired by the stereotype that gay men are really into interior design. And what better way to celebrate that other than making an entire body of work centred on interior decor?

Like in the Greek-inspired pottery, where Mann replaced the images of Gods and soldiers typical of ancient Greece with homosexual imagery.

Or even the way in which the group of statues pictured below shows two men in one of the poses that gay people are often mocked for, reclaiming and elevating to the status of icon something that has been used with negative undertones

In England and Wales, homosexuality was only decriminalised in 1967 after the Sexual Offences Act was passed. The Act decriminalised private homosexual acts between two consenting men aged over 21. The law was not changed in Scotland until 1980 and Northern Ireland in 1982. In 1994 the age of consent for gay men was lowered from 21 to 18, and in 2001 it was lowered again to 16.
 
Mann also takes inspiration from ancient roman culture, by making vases and busts inspired by the tortured romances of emperor Hadrian and Antinous, his Greek same-sex partner who died of mysterious circumstances. And while it was not unusual for Roman rulers to have same-sex partners (as long as they stayed active and in a position of power), the intensity with which Hadrian mourned the death of Antinous was unusual and started a great amount of gossip. Antinous died by drowning in the Nile on the same day that Egyptians were commemorating the death of Osiris, a God who supposedly died in the same way. Rumours spread that Antinous committed suicide or had been sacrificed, while others believed that he sacrificed himself to prolong the life of his king and lover. The love was so strong that Hadrian mourned him so intensely that he built a city in his honour, Antinoopolis, and while he did not directly impose the deification of his lover, he encouraged the creation of a new cult in his honour, which is said to have competed with Christianity for some time.
 
Another story is that of Zeus and Ganymede: Zeus, king of the Greek gods, fell in love with a boy called Ganymede, the prettiest boy on earth. According to the myth, Zeus transformed into an Eagle and kidnapped Ganymede to be his cupbearer. Although the early version of the myth has no homosexual subtext, a later version of the myth added the kidnapper's passion for the boy. Ganymede's kidnapping was a popular topic on 5th century attic vases.
 
Some of the pieces were also inspired by Oscar Wilde. The writer kept his homosexuality a secret - he married and had two sons - but in 1892 he began an affair with Lord Alfred Douglas - a 16 years younger poet and aristocrat. After Douglas' father found out about the relationship, he exposed the two and Wilde was convicted of gross indecency and put on the maximum sentence for the crime - two years of hard labour. The piece below features what is allegedly Wilde's last ever recorded quote before his death.
 
Each of these characters are alive in the exhibition, together with the countless gay men who have been affected by centuries of repression and abuse.
 
The exhibition starts conversations as to where we currently are, historically, in the battle for gay rights. If it is true that social progress comes with the progression of history, how is it that homosexuality was more widely accepted in the distant past of ancient Greece than it was in the 19th century? And where do we stand today, and what can we do to ensure that everyone can access equal rights and dignity? It sheds a light on the fight for the rights of not only homosexual men and the entire LGBT community, but also the fight for the rights of everyone who is oppressed. It is easy to say that what happened to gay people in the past is an abomination, but what are we doing to ensure that no one else has to go through anything like that ever again? Whether it's women, refugees, people of colour or other LGBT people, we need to collectively make sure that the fight for the rights of gay people includes everyone else too, or the suffering that they were put through will be in vain.

The use of print, sculpture, textile and photography really puts the images in a different perspective, by using the same media that could be found in someone's home, adding a sense of credibility to it and creating an atmosphere of immersion in the concept on which the exhibition stands on.

Despite being labelled as a showcase collection of textiles, sculpture, pottery, photography etc, Mann Up proves itself to be much more than a collection of homeware. It raises questions that are social and political, questions that are relevant today more than in any other time in history. I'm not sure if Mark's intentions were to create something that is inherently art activism, but he did, and it makes his pieces not only decoratively beautiful but also socially significant, politically charged. The pieces are something that definitely have the potential to make a long lasting impression. All the pieces get their point across beautifully and with irony, the message gets stuck in your brain delicately and with a subtle irony that encourages people to think about the lack of equal rights many still face everyday. It is surely a recommended view that sheds a light on historical and social issues of contemporary value. One disclaimer: it is at times NSFW and it would probably be better to warn some people before attending it. However, at the same time, do we put NSFW warnings in front of Renaissance frescoes? Or in front of the countless naked women in major museums? Then why should we bother to warn people that this exhibition contains penises? Is it uncomfortable because this time men, and not women, are being treated as passive sexual objects? Is it uncomfortable because the objectification comes from a gay perspective instead of a (male) heterosexual one? The show teaches and questions at the same time.

It was definitely an experience worth having, starting conversations worth making at this point in history.