THE DIVINE EQUINE.
Amy Gagnon (b.2000) is an artist residing and practising on Wurundjeri Land in Naarm (Melbourne). She is currently in her final year of a Bachelor of Fine Arts (Painting) at RMIT University. Recent exhibitions include the group shows ‘Good Strokes for Good Folks’ at PVC Gallery (Naarm, 2022) and ‘Queer Love for Good Love’ at Good Love (Naarm, 2022). She is primarily a painter, and her recent practice considers equestrianism and inter-species relationships.
A fascination with horses and the ‘horse-girl’ trope has informed my recent painting practice, uniquely manifested through the relationship between women and horses. I engage with the female body as protagonist in the making of figurative paintings, which are concerned with feminist modes of thinking, and animal-human relationships.
Through the absurdist language of kitschy, naïve humour, and a pervasive tackiness, I place my female riders in eroticised positions. My practice seeks to reclaim the ‘horse-girl’ trope in the service of women’s sexual self-empowerment. Within these dreamlike, nonsensical, figurative scenes, the women are in the positions of power, mounting, riding, and interacting with the horses. The overall project is a tongue-in-cheek reclamation of empowered feminine bodies in the traditionally masculine space of equestrianism.
