The Best Gallery Weekend Show Was This Shoppable Store
Gallery Weekend Berlin brings a lot of unexpected sights each year, but even I was thrown by seeing the words “double penetration” embossed on the shreds of packing tape decorating a small pop-up shop at Sprüth Magers. Welcome to Dominica Publishing, a temporary boutique by American artist Martine Syms erected for a single weekend that double-penetrated the annual event with a smart mix of art and commerce.
We literally just spent Milan Design Week marveling more at the onslaught of fashion brand activations (and really good staff uniforms) than at actual design, so it’s notable that one of the most exciting events at Gallery Weekend isn’t an actual exhibition.
Taking its name from the imprint Syms launched to explore Blackness “as a topic, reference, marker, and audience in visual culture,” the Dominica Publishing (notice the initials) shop sells a range of merch that, unfortunately, does not include the DP tape. It does, however, offer wearables, bags, and publications from across the artist's career, recontextualizing the notion of a gift shop into a meta-experience fueled by the urgency of streetwear — one weekend only! — and the self-awareness inherent to Syms' practice.
Standouts include caps and sweaters embellished with the kind of all-caps wordplay that Syms has made a signature including, yes, "DOUBLE PENETRATION" and her "TO HELL WITH MY SUFFERING" motif.
One new white graphic tee is printed with an image of a surveillance room from her 2024 exhibition and concept store at Lafayette Anticipations in Paris. Guests of that show wandered a labyrinth of rooms interspersed with merch stands until they reached the top floor, a security station that'd been recording visitors as they navigated the space. The act of surveillance as performance.
Alongside her new merch, Syms has also brought a selection of artworks to Gallery Weekend Berlin inspired by her experience as a Black woman in Los Angeles, including a standout piece featuring a video of a crime scene stitched into a garment bag holding a real Janet Jackson costume she won at auction. The shoppable store taps into an ongoing thread in Syms’ practice, where desire for a product becomes its own kind of performance — even if it's just the urge to buy a commemorative T-shirt.
This is a space in which Syms is supremely comfortable. She's collaborated with Études on apparel and worked with Prada for years, directing seasonal campaigns and headlining the brand’s Prada Mode social event during Frieze LA in 2022. She's also the founder of Chicago’s Golden Age bookshop and project space, which notably hosted the first solo exhibition of digital art heavyweight Jon Rafman in 2010.
The boundaries that once delineated art, design, and commerce have crumbled, leaving space for transgressive artists like Syms to extend their practices to publishing, photography, performance, and even software programming.
Dominica Publishing may be a brief 72-hour aberration, but by breaking out of art’s white cubic box, it's a potent symbol of our fluid cultural moment.
