Anthea Hamilton's 'The Prude' exhibition at Thomas Dane Gallery explores gender through sculptural dysfunction

Anthea Hamilton's exhibition 'The Prude' at Thomas Dane Gallery in London ran from 7 March to 18 May 2019, featuring works that complicate gender through sculptural forms. Black-and-white photographs depict a nude young man in passive poses within a modernist interior, while totem-like sculptures carved from wood or marble present cartoonish profiles of chunky boots. These boots reference 1970s platform soles rather than fetishistic stilettos, with one wooden piece echoing Constantin Brancusi's wavy columns. Soft textile sculptures shaped like butterfly wings, printed with insect patterns, contrast with rigid forms. A giant butterfly leans against a slanted steel partition with a tartan tessellation pattern, overlaid with orange African daisy vinyl on gallery walls. Ceramic-tiled Tetris-block sculptures suggest furniture functions like benches or sedan chairs, mocking solemn postminimalist stiffness. A wall-vinyl reproduction of a Robert Crumb cartoon depicts a fur-covered Amazonian woman in chunky sandals, contrasting with the passive male figure. Hamilton's work questions aesthetic earnestness through cliché, digital fakery, and domestication, avoiding didactic gender commentary. The exhibition spanned both of Thomas Dane's London gallery spaces, with inertia and softness prevailing over rigid geometries.