Virginia Leonard: A Frock Will Hide All Those Sticky Out Bits – 2026 Clay, Tin, Lustre, Resin Exhibition at Side Gallery

The Dries Van Noten Foundation has launched its inaugural exhibition “The Only True Protest is Beauty” in Venice, featuring the ceramic sculpture “A Frock Will Hide All Those Sticky Out Bits He Said” by New Zealand artist Virginia Leonard.

The exhibition opened on April 25, 2026, at the foundation’s venue in Venice, presenting Leonard’s 2026 work as part of its debut program. The sculpture, measuring 60 × 45 × 55h cm, was created with Venice in mind and draws inspiration from Murano glass techniques.

Leonard’s piece is described as an open form inviting viewers to peer inside between gold and silver crowns to observe colored drips that appear to dissolve and disappear. Each tendril of the sculpture carries globs, drips, and smudges that evoke cast glass, chewed sugary lollies, or melting ice.

The work is manufactured from clay, tin, lustre, and resin, and exists as a unique edition piece produced by Side Gallery for the Dries Van Noten Foundation. Leonard, based in Auckland, New Zealand, graduated with a Bachelor of Fine Arts from Whitecliffe College of Arts & Design in 1990 and later completed a Master of Fine Arts with First Class Honours at the same institution.

Her artistic practice centers on representing chronic pain and bodily scarring through ceramic forms, which she describes as visual articulations of her lived experience. Leonard’s work has been presented at major design fairs and has received recognition including First Runner-up at the Wallace Art Awards in Auckland (2020) and the Main Prize at the Officine Saffi Award 4 in Milan (2021).

The Dries Van Noten Foundation’s exhibition positions beauty as a form of protest, with Leonard’s sculpture serving as a key work in this inaugural presentation. The piece continues her exploration of materiality as an emotive assemblage that processes the objectlessness of chronic pain through abstraction.