Brutus presents two new exhibitions: An Uaihm Bhinn and SEX SHOOTER

With her work, Rotterdam-based Hester Scheurwater shows the double standards surrounding female sexuality in contemporary media. With her thinly veiled and sometimes shockingly direct self-portraits, she denounces pretended ideals of beauty and prudish morality. SEX SHOOTER explores gender freedom, identity, desire, social norms, self-expression and representation and can be seen at Brutus from 24 January. Opening simultaneously is An Uaihm Bhinn, a collaboration between artist/composer Lugh O ́Neill and the experimental design and performance collective Temporary Pleasure. Curated by Orpheu de Jong. Both on view until 16 February.

In SEX SHOOTER, Scheurwater tackles the male gaze that reduces women to suffering objects of desire. In her hands, it becomes a weapon of sexual liberation, allowing individuals to express their sexual and gender identities on their own terms. The exhibition showcases nude portraits of people who responded to an open call, giving participants control over their own portraits. This reversal of the traditional power dynamic between photographer and model challenges conventional norms and creates space for authentic self-representation.

Not an abstract pleasure object

Hester Scheurwater invites viewers to reconsider their own preconceptions. The exhibition blurs the boundaries between the public and private domain and reveals the raw reality behind the façade of perfection. By combining formal exhibitions with public interventions, Scheurwater rewrites narratives around gender, self-expression and sexuality.

Sanne ten Brink, director Brutus: "Scheurwater's nudes are not abstract objects of lust - her portraits are the opposite. Scheurwater wrings the female body from the clutches of the fashion and cosmetics industry and demands the right to be able to show herself openly and naked."

An Uaihm Bhinn

For An Uaimh Bhinn, Brutus is transformed by experimental design and performance collective Temporary Pleasure and activated using minimal structures of variable size. They form a stand-alone installation but also serve as a 'location-within-a-location' for an exhibition, performance or other event. Thus, the boundaries between sculpture, stage and spatial sound installation are stretched and blurred.

Central to An Uaimh Bhinn is Lugh O ́Neill's Giants, a sound art piece and video installation with three screens showing a performance that took place between the basalt columns of Fingal's Cave. This cave on the island of Staffa, off the coast of Scotland, is known for its cathedral-like acoustics and, according to local mythology, forms the end of an ancient bridge built by giants.

Giants explores cultural interpretations of acoustic spaces, looking specifically at the ritualistic role natural structures have played in the past. Techniques such as reverb and echo have been used in recording studios for almost a century to simulate movement in time and space. But by approaching recording and composition as a spatial practice and considering sound as a means of fathoming environments, we could consider sound as a doorway to past experiences.

In An Uaimh Bhinn, Lugh O'Neill and Temporary Pleasure create an acoustic and spatial environment that constantly transforms, from exhibition space to installation and stage. Within it, they invite musicians, artists and audiences to a collective musical experience that can be contemplative, ecstatic and even emotionally cleansing.