I was wrong. Andrew Krasnow started making art from human skin acquired “through legal and simple means” almost 20 years ago in the lead up to the Gulf War. Krasnow made an American flag entirely of human skin which asking the viewer were they “willing to show blind allegiance to the flag?” The work was censored because Andrew voiced his fear that the war “would not be conducted openly and in a way that was moral and ethical.” When cultural centres in America refused to show the flag because it questioned political leaders the irony simply proved that America had essentially become a dictatorship and many lives had and would be lost not in defence of liberty but to keep an autocratic regime in power.

I also learnt that Krasnow’s attachment to skin as a medium for his art was not random but informed by painful personal experience. When he was 5 years old, his sister suffered third degree burns in a fire in which she saved the lives of two other children. Both Andrew’s parents endured agonizing and repetitive skin grafting to help their daughter but she died. Andrew’s childhood memories are therefore steeped of the importance

There are other works in “Of The Flesh” that demonstrate the distastefulness of consumerism like a hamburger made from skin and filled with teeth; this point is further illustrated by the fact that none of the skin works are for sale.

These are not abstract works. The messages are clear and powerful which I appreciate finding much of abstract (often a euphemism for “lazy”) art where a red line on a black canvas is supposed to represent the theory of evolution, without a monkey in sight, akin to The Emperor‘s New Clothes. Krasnow’s work is direct; there are bullets wrapped in skin, a pair of skin cowboy boots and a baseball cap and to every piece of this artwork he adds some skin grafted from him in a surgical procedure.

I did not find “Of the Flesh” eerie; skin looks like leather and the integrity of the work surpasses its unusual medium. In this comprehensive, detailed collection, a range of installments illustrate powerful political and religious statements as well as spiritual sentiments. Romance and gentleness are found in a delicate pair of angel wings and my favourite piece; “Soul Loss” where a small, saddened, embryonic figure is hunched over, eyes to the sky, tip-toeing tentatively forward in search of their errant soul. Whilst this image is emblematic of many of us who are somehow disenfranchised from their soul, it demonstrates Andrew Krasnow is someone with a clear connection to his.

I was deeply touched by this exhibition in a way that I was not expecting. A gentle, visceral, spiritual experience. Courageous and sensitive.

Inivotive and thoughtful curation creates a profound experience….
which touches the six senses, mind, body, spirit. Physically affecting, mentally provocative and emotionally moving.

Of The Flesh filled me with respect for the human condition – its frailty and vulnerability, its boundaries (skin), its bravery and strength…

Highly Recommended.

Don’t know if it’s related…