Exquisite Corpse, An Exhibition Of Fun and Interesting Art

Exquisite Corpse, An Exhibition Of Fun and Interesting Art

Exquisite Corpse, also known as Exquisite Cadaver (from the original French term cadavre exquis), is a game thought to have originated by the surrealists in the early part of the 20th century as a parlour game.  Lore has it that it started with players passing a folded piece of paper around, concealing the written parts and adding to the writings until an entire piece was finished with each player’s writing part of the whole.

The name was derived when the surrealists first played the game in art.  Each participant drawing an image then piecing the drawings together.

Exquisite Corpse started in St Petersburg in 2015 with Exquisite Corpse International and morphed into it’s current Exquisite Corpse Games.  Artists were invited to participate being assigned a portion of the human body: head, torso and legs/feet.  Non of the artists new who the others were or what part the others were assigned.

The resulting works were unveiled during a special exhibition night.  It was then that each artist, and visitors to the exhibition, saw who they were paired up with and how their work meshed with the others.  The opening exhibition has always been held at the Museum of Fine Arts in St Petersburg and in 2017 was display at the Chihuly Museum in downtown St Pete.

I had the honor and pleasure of participating in the 2016 and 2017 exhibitions and can say in all sincerity that some of the most interesting, fun and engaging work in the Tampa Bay area has come from the participating artists in Exquisite Corpse.