Juxtaposing soft, delicate flowers and pastels with darker hued provocative accessories, Helena Calmfors’ debut solo exhibit, curated by Indira Cesarine at The Untitled Space, certainly lives up to its name: Floral Disciplines. The exquisiteness of contrast is imbued by interlocking blooms and crosshatched lingerie, situated among cuffs, ticklers and other fetish iconography. Fractallizing various mediums—albeit watercolor, photography, and performance— the Swedish-born, Brooklyn-based artist’s work is a commentary on contrasting sentiments: Vulnerability vs. Strength; Domination vs. Devotion; Rebellion and Beauty.
Helena’s work is centered around taking control of the male gaze through the practice of femdom. Basalt latex and gunmetal leather marbled with imprints of pastel pearl, mauve and rose watercolor-pen crosshatched undergarments, Helena’s compositions transcend typical eroticism. They transform the act of watching into a reflection of power.
#Meetoo movement changed everything after, including how men approach women nowadays. Generally, more passive and peacock, men expect or assume women are eagerto pay or initiate contact. Fearful of pressuring (if decent), they assume women willingly take control, (as opposed to out of necessity), and have seemingly relegated themselves to being enjoyed. Pursued… Provided for.
Helena Calmfors addresses issues around reclaiming ownership of body and identity through hierarchical power-play. According to Siri Hustvedt from “We Need to Talk about Erotic Art” published in CNN Style
“We masculinize and feminize human activities all the time. The hard sciences are masculine and cerebral; the arts are soft and feminine. And because the arts are broadly coded as feminine, and erotic art in particular evokes the lower sensations and emotions, it becomes all the more important to give it a high, mental, masculine stamp.”
However, Helena Calmfors topsy turvies this inherent assignment of erotic agency to men. Statistics show that in 1985, less than 5% of artists were female, but over 85% of nude artworks represented females. Despite the changing times, it remains timelessly refreshing to witness a woman responsibly and powerfully steering agency of the male (and female) gaze. “Each piece becomes both reflection and resistance—a refusal to be sanitized or silenced,” notes founder Indira Cesarine of Untitled Magazine:
“Helena’s work embodies the kind of fearless vulnerability that defines contemporary feminist art […] her ability to merge softness with strength—to make the erotic both tender and political—invites a necessary dialogue about control, identity, and power. It’s a radical act of Reclamation in a world that still seeks to confine the female and queer gaze.”
—>exhibition opening, The Untitled Space gallery, October 23, 2025, Photos by Chia-Ta Tsai
