John Meade: It’s personal! was curated with the artist to reflect various personal threads in John Meade’s work relating to alterity, including queer culture, politics, and artistic experimentation. Through sculpture, video, and installation, Meade draws relations between the metaphysical and surreal in the experience of contemporary life and culture. A refined and adventurous materiality defines his work, through sensuous forms and unexpected juxtapositions inflected by the erotic and uncanny.

It’s personal! was a reflection on some of the psychological and societal drivers that have informed Meade’s life and art. The title refers to the way personal subjectivity shapes the sculptures Meade creates, and references Carol Hanisch’s seminal essay from 1970, ‘The Personal is Political’, which outlines the pragmatism of women coming together to share their personal experience as a basis for collective action.

The exhibition featured three large new works exploring abstract form alongside key sculptures from three decades of Meade’s practice, installed across three expansive gallery spaces and outdoors at McClelland. The exhibition coincided with Meade’s major public sculpture Love Flower (2019) installed at McClelland as part of the Southern Way McClelland Commissions.

Images: John Meade: It’s personal!, installation views, McClelland. Photos Simon Lawrie.