Inside Carole Feuerman’s Studio at Mana Contemporary

The first time I saw Carole Feuerman’s work was the first time I was ever introduced to the art world during Art Basel Miami Beach in 2010. It was at Scope Art Show and her piece ‘Survival of Serena’ was a show highlight. I wondered how could something wo(man)-made, be constructed to be so life-like and present for you.

But that’s what Feuerman’s work does – it brings hyper-realism to the forefront of the conversation and forces you to pay attention to the work. Mana Contemporary presented her solo exhibit ‘The Golden Mean’ to the public after two years of working on new pieces.

There some old favorites like the aforementioned ‘Survival of Serena’ and two new, exquisite site-specific installations. ‘Olympus’ acts as a portrait of US Gold Medalist Lauren Perdue, where a sculpture in her likeness is situated in lap-pool with water and lane ropes.

While indoors, Feuerman collaborated with Italian artist Michaelangelo Basiani to join her sculpture of a naked female body adorned with a swim cap bursting out of Bastiani’s geyser video installation.

While all of these pieces on view were incredible – the real treat was to see Feuerman’s artist studio at Mana. Her studio gives you an inside view of the artist’s process which I find to be pretty thrilling – because when looking at a Carole Feurman piece, you’re asking yourself how did she do this/ While the artist was not present in her studio, you can get a feel of her in the space as casts, prototypes and unfinished objects lie about the space. Then, mid-studio you see Feuerman’s pristine collection of tools – with what I can imagine play an integral part of creating her sculptures.