The human body is the core theme of Clandestine. Through more than a hundred photographs, the exhibition expresses an unreserved love of the body in all its manifestations: perfect, imperfect, elegant, erotic, defiant, proud, and vulnerable.

Curated by Sylvia Navarrete Bouzard, French Mexican researcher, art critic and curator, the exhibition is drawn from the extensive collection of Mexican photographer and collector Pedro Slim (born in Beirut, Lebanon in 1950). The Pedro Slim Collection holds a unique position in its field due to its particularity: in 1985, Slim started collecting photographs in which the human body is front and center and that challenge gender stereotypes, moderation standards and clichés of good taste. In his collection, depictions of the body doesn’t only signify intimacy and lust, but also disclose information about the social context in which they were captured.

Clandestine – The Human Body in Focus presents 112 photographs by some 60 artists, including Diane Arbus, Horst P. Horst, Arlene Gottfried, Graciela Iturbide, Robert Mapplethorpe, Diana Blok, Helmut Newton, Lola Álvarez Bravo, Mary Ellen Mark, Nan Goldin, and Man Ray. All black and white and gelatin silver printed, these images do not seek to be neutral nor low-profile: they privilege expressiveness over beauty,  they praise rebellion, ambivalence, and freedom.

The exhibition is divided into 3 sections: The unlimited body, Experiences from the margin and Arlene Gottfried. In the first, canonical artists reflect on old and new paradigms of beauty and hedonism; in the second, a recent generation of artists provide visual experiences of marginality and emancipation, blurring the line between art and documentary. The third part of the exhibition is entirely devoted to the work of American photographer Arlene Gottfried (1950-2017), presenting 21 photographs taken in the height of her career amidst the underground culture of the New York City of the 1970s and 80s.

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