Lovetoy

Feb 10- March 17 2024, Holsum Gallery

Lovetoy is soft. LoveToy is sticky sweet. Lovetoy is a deep, intense affection. Lovetoy is looking for the condom between the quilt. It relishes not being able to sit for three days. Lovetoy is a series of one night stands, situationships, maybe a couple texts, and a three year long flirtation. Batting its eyelashes and twirling its hair; it sighs, it grimaces, it winks—because Lovetoy is casual. This time, but not always. Not forever.

This exhibition is an investigation into desire and the way it makes us obsess over each other. Over and over (and over) again. Nathan Ford stitches the romantic encounters of good, bad, and grimy dating discourse, repurposing fabric and personal ephemera into collaged experiences. Bernadette Negrete uses body humor as a vessel for an uncomfortable intimacy. Wood and rhinestone act as metaphor, telling inside jokes through her materials and processes. Here, dirty jokes are foreplay and romance resides within every seam.

Lovetoy is, and Lovetoy was, and will be, eternally, irrevocably in love with you....

Poster by Nathan Ford
Didactic by Bernadette Negrete and Jackob Graves