HELSINKI.- Sarah Lucas (b. 1962) is an influential and internationally acclaimed artist known for her irreverent and provocative use of satire in her sculptural practice. Her exhibition at Kiasma offers a comprehensive overview of her career to date, showcasing sculpture, photography, and installations from the past four decades—including new and recent works—many of which have featured in celebrated exhibitions around the world. This marks Lucas’s first extensive solo presentation in the Nordic region.

Lucas works with everyday ‘readymade’ materials—furniture, food, cigarettes, and pantyhose—reassembling them in compositions that evoke the human body in all its fragility with desirousness, humour, and eroticism.

Lucas’s practice critically engages with unspoken assumptions surrounding gender, sexuality, and power dynamics. Her work questions societal perceptions of the body, while also probing traditional depictions of class and the complex relationship between art and social hierarchy.

Lucas weaves together these socially resonant themes with sharp everyday observations, often delivered with signature wit and a playful use of language.

“There’s a slippage in humour that I like. It can affect and even change existing meanings. Slant them in another direction. It shows things up. Also, if humour is working, it provokes an emotional response. Not always laughter.” – Sarah Lucas, Apollo, September 2023

Lucas studied at Goldsmiths College and rose to prominence in the late 1980s and is often associated with the Young British Artists (YBAs), alongside figures such as Damien Hirst, Tracey Emin, and Gary Hume. The group’s bold use of unconventional materials and provocative approach to art redefined the British art scene in the 1990s.

“When I moved to London in the late 1990s, visual art was deeply embedded in the broader cultural scene—with Sarah Lucas right at the heart of it. She served as a bridge between contemporary art and popular culture, opening doors for many. There was a powerful sense that anything was possible,” says Kiasma Chief Curator Anna Mustonen.

Over the years, Lucas has presented her art at prominent institutions internationally such as the Red Brick Art Museum in Beijing, the Freud Museum in London, the Hammer Museum in Los Angeles, and the New Museum in New York. Tate Britain hosted a major survey of her work in 2023-24 and Lucas represented Britain at the 2015 Venice Biennale. Selected works from that show are included in the Kiasma exhibition.

NAKED EYE has been curated by Kiasma’s Patrik Nyberg and Max Hannus.