What grew out of a one-person show in Jack the Pelican's project room earlier this year has dug in its heels — or hooves, as the case may be — and turned into a summer-long residency and semi-permanent installation. New York multimedia artist Gregory de la Haba's not-to-be-missed masterpiece Equus Maximus is ambitious to say the least, involving life-size taxidermy show-horses in full Vegas dance-hall regalia, and sporting exaggerated sex organs, a casino table, a suite of lavishly staged, ornately costumed photographic portraits, a soundtrack, and mood lighting.

The overall effect is at once baroque and erotic, emotionally charged, and animated by a certain primitive, tribal sorcery
that lends a deep soulfulness to the tableau's splashy titillation.

Shana Nys Dambrot
Art Critic
Flavorpill