REN HANG, SELECTED WORKS
PHOTOGRAPHY Megan Christiansen PHOTOGRAPHY Megan Christiansen

REN HANG, SELECTED WORKS

Ren Hang, who took his life February 23, 2017, was an unlikely rebel. Slight of build, shy by nature, prone to fits of depression, the 29-year-old Beijing photographer was nonetheless at the forefront Chinese artists’ battle for creative freedom…

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YOKO ONO, CUT PIECE, 1964
PERFORMANCE Megan Christiansen PERFORMANCE Megan Christiansen

YOKO ONO, CUT PIECE, 1964

Ono gave her first performance of Cut Piece (1964) in Kyotoin July 1964. She sat motionless on stage in a traditional Japanese feminine position, and invited members of the audience to cut a piece of her clothing away…

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THOMAS RUFF, NUDES
PHOTOGRAPHY, PORNOGRAPHY Megan Christiansen PHOTOGRAPHY, PORNOGRAPHY Megan Christiansen

THOMAS RUFF, NUDES

The nudes series was created by Ruff downloading photographs from online pornographic thumbnail galleries and enlarging and distorting them to varying degrees. Literally and figuratively blurring the boundaries between pornography, formalist nude photography, and the art historical genre of the nude…

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PAUL PFEIFFER, RACE RIOT, 2001
VIDEO ART, INSTALLATION Megan Christiansen VIDEO ART, INSTALLATION Megan Christiansen

PAUL PFEIFFER, RACE RIOT, 2001

In Race Riot, Paul Pfeiffer memorializes the 1996 NBA Championship in which the Chicago Bulls win the tournament. The basic image is a clip from the final victory—the moment in which Michael Jordan falls to the floor, back to the camera, hugging the ball as his teammates gather around him...

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TOMMY KHA, I’M ONLY HERE TO LEAVE, 2015-PRESENT
PHOTOGRAPHY Megan Christiansen PHOTOGRAPHY Megan Christiansen

TOMMY KHA, I’M ONLY HERE TO LEAVE, 2015-PRESENT

I’m Only Here to Leave – a phrase taken from a conversation Kha had when he met performance artist and musician Genesis P-Orridge – started out as a series of cardboard cutout images of the photographer’s face and body, which he placed into ­real-world surroundings…

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DEBORAH WILLIS, I MADE SPACE FOR A GOOD MAN, 2009
PHOTOGRAPHY Megan Christiansen PHOTOGRAPHY Megan Christiansen

DEBORAH WILLIS, I MADE SPACE FOR A GOOD MAN, 2009

Printed at the Brandywine Workshop and Archives in Philadelphia, this color lithograph features a film photography triptych of Deborah Willis (presumably late 1975 or early 1976). In two of the three self-portraits, Willis sits reclining in a wicker chair wearing a black dress, eyes closed or cast down…

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ARTHUR JAFA, LOVE IS THE MESSAGE, THE MESSAGE IS DEATH, 2016
FILM Megan Christiansen FILM Megan Christiansen

ARTHUR JAFA, LOVE IS THE MESSAGE, THE MESSAGE IS DEATH, 2016

From photographs of civil rights leaders watermarked with “Getty Images” to helicopter views of the LA Riots to a wave of bodies dancing to “The Dougie,” the meticulously edited 7-minute video suspends viewers in a swelling, emotional montage that is a testament to Jafa’s profound ability to mine, scrutinize, and reclaim media’s representational modes and strategies…

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PIPILOTTI RIST, EVER IS OVER ALL, 1997
FILM Megan Christiansen FILM Megan Christiansen

PIPILOTTI RIST, EVER IS OVER ALL, 1997

From her early music-video-style works to her later immersive projection environments, Rist’s unique artistic vocabulary is rooted in popular culture, technology, and historical feminist video art…

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PETER HUJAR, LOVE & LUST, 1969-1986
PHOTOGRAPHY Megan Christiansen PHOTOGRAPHY Megan Christiansen

PETER HUJAR, LOVE & LUST, 1969-1986

Celebrated and revered by artists, the work of Peter Hujar remains something of a public secret, but his photographs dealing with sex and eroticism, made between the years 1969 and 1986, have come to define a certain era in New York…

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AYANA V JACKSON, TAKE ME TO THE WATER
PHOTOGRAPHY Megan Christiansen PHOTOGRAPHY Megan Christiansen

AYANA V JACKSON, TAKE ME TO THE WATER

Jackson uses the archival impulse to assess the impact of the colonial gaze on the history of photography and its relationship to ideas about the body. She uses her lens to deconstruct 19th and early 20th-century portraiture as a means for questioning photography’s role in constructing identities…

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