The Subtle Body

The Subtle Body brings into conversation the archives of artists Katy Dove (1970–2015) and Lygia Clark (1920–1988) to explore their mutual occupation with bodily knowledge and the subconscious.

Katy Dove’s expansive, collaborative practice encompassed drawing, animation, sound, and movement, underscored by her sustained interest in psychology. Lygia Clark, a cofounder of the Brazilian Neo-Concrete group, made painting and sculpture before abandoning conventional practice to develop psychoanalytical tools, participatory exercises, and healing rituals.

Paying attention to the therapeutic resonances enfolded in both practices, The Subtle Body yields a correspondence between Clark and Dove based on a shared study of the ways that meaning emerges through gesture and sensorial experience, and how their artworks might act upon and be transformed by - the body. Displaying their works, materials, and documentation in companionship considers the archive as a living, mutable collection with many responsive possibilities.

Held at Kinning Park Complex, an active neighbourhood space and former school with a history of collective action - celebrating 30 years in 2026 since its radical community sit-in - The Subtle Body connects Dove and Clark’s commitments to participation, education, and collective forms of making.