Contemporary perceptions of female sexuality are deeply influenced by Foucauldian biopolitics, religious habituations, socio-political constructs and psychosomatic effects. The pharmacopornographic regime of the XXI century further complicates this perspective due to an exaggerated tilt towards technocapitalism, global media and bio-technologies. It is amongst these Deleuzian societies of control that Dipali Gupta’s art subverts notions of patriarchy, androcentricity and binarism, engaging the materiality of devices associated with sex, desire and pleasure. The concept of the assemblage and Donna Haraway’s cyborg are at the heart of her explorations as she investigates the nexus of the sex toy and female sexuality in its constant state of becoming, regeneration and experimentation.
Layering concepts with artistic canons and re-appropriating less significant genres, Dipali’s work comments on artistic practices that were historically male dominated. Her multi-disciplinary practice reconstructs the past to defy socio-political myths of reproduction, domestication, spectatorship, self and identity. The absence of the female body in her drawings, videos, performances and mixed mediums rupture the signifier of female sexuality which is traditionally lauded to be sexual and objectified for the male gaze.
Dipali Gupta lives and works between Malaysia and Singapore and her work has been showcased across South East Asia exhibiting in Hong Kong, Kuala Lumpur, Singapore, with collaborations, symposiums and performances in Portugal and New Delhi. She won the prestigious Chan Davies Art Prize in 2018 and was nominated for the Young Master’s Art Prize 2019 and The Wells Art Contemporary Award 2020, London.