Jim Shaw: The Ties That Bind

M HKA Museum of Contemporary Art Antwerp presents a major solo exhibition of the work of Jim Shaw from February 9 until May 19, 2024. 

The Ties That Bind examines the development of an artistic practice that for fifty years has reflected, or perhaps even anticipated, the escalation of a political and cultural climate that is now in the throes of implosion and transformation. At a time when society is increasingly polarised, Shaw's art acts as an ally for questioning the (sometimes recalcitrant) ideological underpinnings that took root in the aftermath of the Second World War, and have continued to shape the United States of America, and by extension much of the Western world, ever since.

The exhibition focuses on the artist's recent work—which, to this day, has not yet garnered institutional visibility—and is punctuated by a selection of historical works that embody Shaw's lifelong analysis of his time. The Ties That Bind takes shape as an environment steeped in a peculiar tone: it is both regressive and mutating, weird and fascinating, haunting and liberating. 

This first solo exhibition of Jim Shaw's work in Belgium features drawings, paintings, videos and photographs alongside large-scale immersive installations. Together, the works highlight some of the fundamental, recurring motifs that have inhabited and shaped the artist's work since the outset, such as male representations (including self-portraits), hairstyles and wigs, monsters and ghosts, and domestic appliances. These elements all reflect Jim Shaw's interest in analysing structures of power and control. Among other works, the exhibition features a vast selection of more than 150 Study Drawings produced over the last ten years; The Wig Museum (2017), a theatrical landscape that viewers can walk through, described by the artist as a gateway to a “shopping mall in hell”; the most comprehensive presentation to date of the Thrift Store Paintings collection and The Electronic Monster and Thirteen Ghosts (2024), a new audio-visual installation inspired by the memories of a double-bill horror movie the artist saw at the cinema when he was nine years old.

The Ties That Bind immersers the viewer into Jim Shaw’s allegorical world, where tradition and innovation, popular culture and politics, social criticism and humour are intricately interwoven.

Curator: Anne-Claire Schmitz

Institutional partner: Kunsthaus Pasquart, Biel, Switzerland
A variation of the exhibition will be on view at Kunsthaus Pasquart from 8 June until 25 August 2024. 

Main support: Nationale Loterij – Loterie Nationale