Karma is pleased to present Piotr Uklański’s Pornalikes (2002–ongoing): a series of photographs derived from the artist’s image archive depicting porn actors who strongly resemble famous contemporary personalities.

Cultural readymades, these Pornalikes are contributed to ‘men’s magazines’ or celebrity obsessed blogs such as Loaded or phica.net by their readers. Uklański’s image compilation offers a hyper sexualized portrait of our celebrity obsessed culture. By focusing on the exploitative power structures that drive the current politics and entertainment industry, Uklański takes our ‘fame whoring’ zeitgeist to extreme ends by conflating the exploitative male gaze of pornography with the obscene desire that propels the pursuit of fame.

Uklański’s Pornalikes was first exhibited at Zachęta National Gallery of Art in Warsaw in 2012.

Forthcoming in June 2013, KARMA will publish Uklański’s lushly illustrated artist book Pornalikes.