BODE@thestudio is pleased to present Milieu, a group exhibition in Cape Town that centers women artists from the ‘Global South’ working within abstraction. The show will feature works by Chuma Adam, Taqwa Ali, Ana Sant‘Anna, and Keonah Nyembe.
Within the historical art canon, abstraction has been dominated by male artists, a pattern entrenched since the mid-twentieth century. Milieu seeks to challenge this lineage by foregrounding women’s practices and interrogating the gendered ways in which abstraction is approached, understood, and produced.
Research indicates that, when investing, women are significantly more likely than their male counterparts to prioritise community development and organisations with strong Environmental, Social, and Governance commitments. Whether shaped by nature or nurture, this tendency suggests that women have a heightened attunement to their micro- and macro-environments, as well as a greater concern for the pursuit of participatory and communal futures.
Milieu extends this perspective into the realm of abstraction, examining how women artists interpret and engage with the world through colour, mark-making, and process. In doing so, the exhibition expands the archive of abstraction, proposing alternative frameworks shaped by relational, environmental, and lived experience.