Pippy Houldsworth Gallery’s presentation initiates a dialogue between feminist icons and the younger generation, reflecting the programme as a whole. Identity and metamorphosis are key themes running through the works, which present diverse approaches to these enduring concerns.

Those of the older generation have each drawn on their experience of activist communities in the 1960s and 1970s. On view is a rare painting, Scharesliep (1965) by Jacqueline de Jong made in the period when she joined and was ousted from the Situationist International, founded and edited The Situationist Times, and marched in the May ’68 protests. Vintage prints and works made in the first two decades of Ming Smith’s career are highlighted. In the early 1970s, Smith became the first female member of the Kamoinge Workshop, an African American collective founded to further photography as an art-form and take ownership of their own image as black artists. A foundational figure of conceptual and feminist art, Mary Kelly’s practice draws together the personal and the political, considering the impact of historical events on everyday lives. Included is Alderney Street, 1973 (2014), a work that considers the feminist movement of the 1970s and 1980s in relation to present day feminism.

The younger artists build on these achievements, drawing on the context of a world increasingly connected and saturated with information. Highlights include new paintings by Jadé Fadojutimi and Stefanie Heinze. The works made in 2020 encompass issues hotly debated in contemporary politics – touching on sexuality, race and gender – in addition to questions of human nature, self-determination, and the visual and linguistic tools with which we navigate the world around us. From Angela Heisch’s luminous forms, to the intimacy of Wangari Mathenge’s portraiture and Zoë Buckman’s textiles, the artists together work across the spectrum of abstraction and figuration. Created specifically for the fair, the new works offer an exhilarating response to contemporary painting and sculpture.

Art Basel Miami Beach 2020 Preview