On Guard

On Guard was inspired by “Life Doesn’t Frighten Me,” a book that combines a poem by renowned author and activist Maya Angelou with illustrations by artist Jean-Michel Basquiat. Angelou’s simple and empowering sentences, accompanied by the visually strong images of Basquiat’s works, deliver the overall message that life’s fears can be dispelled through the power of faith in ourselves.

On Guard is meant to be a reminder of the courage within all of us and to empower viewers to fight for their rights on both personal and collective levels.

The exhibition brings together a group of contemporary artists exploring the sport of boxing in relation to the nature of life that always keeps us on our feet and on guard. Boxing is a performance business and, in this sense, it easily translates to an exhibition. The sport once represented masculine destructivity, but nowadays it is one of femme empowerment and self-defense.

While On Guard centers on female-identifying artists, the multifaceted components of their identities and practice are to be present in the exhibition as well. With a multi-sensory experience that features multidisciplinary works, the show examines not only courage and fears, strength and vulnerability, but also notions of gender equality, safety and violence, as well as the sport’s poetic contradictions, all through traditional and non-traditional depictions of boxing-related imagery.