KUMUKUMU is proud to present its inaugural exhibition BUN, a group show exploring the potent symbolism and imagery of the bunny rabbit. With artists from Japan, France and the Americas, the exhibition takes a cross-cultural look beyond the traditional notions of innocence and fertility into each artist’s highly specific meaning. Ray Johnson was inspired by the famous rabbit-duck optical illusion, a ripe topic for philosophers and appealing to Ray as a “twofer”—dual representation springing from a single image; Franco Mondini-Ruiz presents two works of a rabbit smoking; and Adam Fuss provides a meditation on fertility and death, beauty and disgust, as his photographic plate decorated with rabbit entrails creates an undeniably aesthetic and sensual image. Indeed, the rabbit’s traditional associations with childhood, shyness and sexuality serve as fodder for a wide range of artistic explorations. Some artists take the formal characteristics of the rabbit’s perfectly symmetrical nose as a starting point. BUN aims to articulate a collective portrait of the rabbit by exhibiting the diverse approaches of artists to the subject matter.

Representation of the rabbit has a long history, stretching back to its foundational modern image created by Albrecht Dürer. Dürer’s rabbit has a mysterious, grounded gaze, focused down at the worldly rather than up toward transcendence in the sky. It is connected to the land, an herbivore embedded in, not atop, the food chain. Yet the rabbit is frequently anthropomorphized as an animal of civility. Many of the strongest associations with rabbits are forged in childhood, through stories like Alice’s Adventure in Wonderland, Brier Rabbit, the Easter Bunny and the Tortoise and the Hare. However, rabbits are killed and eaten as game animals, while simultaneously representing maternal power.

Artists on exhibition include Mac Adams, Roger Ballen, Joseph Beuys, Adam Fuss, Ken Hamazaki, Ray Johnson, Myriam Mechita, Franco Mondini-Ruiz, Vik Muniz, Lori Nix, Michelle Rollman, Kiki Smith, Anita Steckel, Diana Thorneycroft, Hannah Whitaker and others. The opening reception will feature artist Ken Hamazaki’s “Red Tea Ceremony” performance.

KUMUKUMU is a contemporary art gallery opening in the burgeoning art locus of the Lower East Side, two blocks from the New Museum. The gallery represents emerging and internationally-recognized artists of all media, including contemporary ceramics, with a program focused on gender, social, historical and environmental issues. The gallery will invite a diverse group of people to interact in and create a new milieu downtown.