Head Over Heels: Kevin Sabo
-
RHODES presents Head Over Heels, a new body of work by Kevin Sabo. This exhibition marks the artist’s second solo show with the gallery, following his sold-out 2025 debut Louche.
Working within a restrained palette of black and cream, punctuated by controlled flashes of colour, Sabo pushes proportion to the edge of theatricality. Figures tilt, elongate and swell, charged with a heightened, almost electrical presence. Drawing on the amplified codes of drag — femininity cranked beyond naturalism, suspended between demure poise and unapologetic display — Sabo constructs characters that feel at once archetypal and intimate. The seductress, the pop icon, manicured poodles, fish bowls and caged birds circulate as recurring motifs: classic iconographies reanimated to carry both allure and satire.
Though cartoonish in their elasticity, these figures are created with careful precision in graphite. Mid-century stylisation and twentieth-century expressionist styles inform the balance Sabo strikes between exaggeration and tenderness.
“I’m interested in that intersection — playful and tender at the same time. The character isn’t separate from me, even as a queer man. She’s not a literal parallel — it’s about energy. There’s fantasy involved, like drag. I’m inventing allure through proportion and leaving the door open for connection.”
In earlier works, Sabo isolated his figures against blank grounds, allowing negative space to heighten their presence. Here, subtle architectural cues enter the frame. Skyscrapers, concrete and passing cars are faintly implied, situating the protagonists within a natureless cityscape. This is not a celebration of futurity but an examination of what queer-centric feminine joy might look like against a bleaker backdrop. The absence of the suited businessmen that populated previous series is notable; the feminine figure now occupies the pictorial field entirely, uncontained yet curiously staged. Hyper-groomed domestic animals intensify this sense of artifice, introducing a quiet dystopian undercurrent.
Sabo’s process mirrors the thematic tension embedded in the imagery. Loose sketches are drawn directly onto canvas and washed with thin, airy layers before being worked over in graphite. The surface is then smeared horizontally with matte medium and a broad brush, dragging the image towards near-erasure. Once dry, crisp planes of dark and cream are reintroduced, carving definition from haze. The result is a surface that oscillates between freedom and control — buoyant, strange and quietly defiant.
Kevin Sabo (b. 1994, United States) lives and works Richmond, VA. He has presented solo exhibitions internationally and has participated in numerous group presentations across the US and Europe. His works have been presented at prestigious art fairs, including NADA and Untitled Art, and in 2026 he is taking part in the PLOP Residency London. Head Over Heels at RHODES marks the artist’s second solo exhibition with the gallery.
-
-
Selected works
-
-
Collecting
-
-
-
-
Subscribe →
Join our mailing list for updates about our artists, exhibitions, events, and more.
