Jonathan V Green
COCOON
2024
Vinyl, surgical compression top, mastectomy pillow, faux leather, nylon rope on canvs
30 x 24”
June 6-27 Snap Space Gallery
HEAVEN IS HELL by Jonathan Virginia Green is an exhibition that functions as a biographical survey of the artist’s relationship to erotic intimacy and grief. Personal fantasies and intimate encounters are abstracted and distilled into sensual forms that are alluring, but with a sense of danger. Green’s work combines leather, rubber, and chrome surfaces (both real and simulated) with hardware such as zippers, chains, and bondage gear. These materials allude to apparel and by extension, the body. Often including leather gear formerly used by himself or friends, the sculptures are imbued with a history of queer desire. Green embraces leather as a practice and a material, exploiting it as a vehicle for transformation. This transformation can be both physical and/or psychological. In addition to leather, horror films, especially of the body horror genre inform the aesthetics of Green’s work. Both leather and body horror can provide catharsis and relief relating to past trauma. Green’s own recent gender affirming surgery, heartache and loss are subjects that are eroticized by the artist to create alternative ways of processing grief. HEAVEN IS HELL asks viewers to consider the paradoxical nature of pain and pleasure, and of experiencing freedom in bondage.
Jonathan Virginia Green is a multidisciplinary visual artist from Tulsa, Oklahoma. He uses his art to explore mechanisms of desire, pleasure, and transformation that are oriented within his experience as a queer and transgender male. His work consists of painting, sculpture, photography, and installations. He graduated from the University of Tulsa with a BFA in painting in 2011. Green has exhibited his art across the United States with solo exhibitions in Oklahoma, Arkansas, Kansas, and Missouri. In 2022, Green graduated from the University of Arkansas with an MFA in Studio Art. He currently works and resides in Kansas City, MO.