Jenny holzer biography – jenny holzer on artnet

The text-based art of Jenny Holzer appears in places one wouldn't expect to find it. On t-shirts, billboards, parking meters and LED signs Holzer's signature medium , her stark one-liners call attention to social injustice and shed light on dark corners of the human psyche. A political activist as well as an artist, Holzer's aim is to disrupt the passive reception of information from damaging sources.

As her reputation has grown, so has the ambition and scope of her work, which has traveled to public spaces in much of the world. In her profound skepticism toward power, Holzer joins the ranks of anti-authoritarians in art from the birth of modernism which is itself a rebellion against tradition through the 21 st century. In the Living Series , Holzer used bronze plaques, the sort on which names of donors, historical dates and other information are typically inscribed.

Instead of institutional signage, however, Holzer's plaques address the viewer directly.

Jenny holzer exhibitions

Enigmatic, often inconclusive phrases address the necessities of life: eating, breathing, sleeping, human relationships, and daily anxieties. Even in a gallery, this work blends into the environment, rather than standing out. When we do read the text, it is inconclusive, articulating a train of thought that may strike us as humorous, or anxiety provoking, depending on the day and the viewer, but which ultimately leaves us hanging.

In the Living Series , she claimed her aim was "to have the look of a voice of authority, of the establishment" while remaining anonymous. Here, at an early moment in Holzer's career, we see the germ of an idea that would carry her career forward: the notion of blurring the boundary between public and private, and making us want to know more about the source of authority that displays written information.

LED technology was relatively new in the early s. Signboards were capable of displaying blocky letters in varying fonts, colors, and simple graphics. At first glance, this piece could easily be mistaken for an electronic signboard transmitting public announcements, instructions, or advertisements. Its fifty-four statements and messages spin through a single LED sign, ranging from humorous to disturbing, and communicating private thoughts many of which are inappropriate in polite conversation.