ART CITIES:Los Angeles-Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger’s work with pictures and words has become iconic for the reach of its political and social critique. In only a few words, printed large in uppercase block print, Kruger manages to satirize, denounce, and illuminate the uses of power and force in art, culture, and language. The bold, massive statements printed in her signature towering uppercase letters spell out a critique and succinct analysis of the state of politics, desire, sexism, and consumerism today.
By Efi Michalarou
Photo: MOCA Archive
The bold, graphic works of Barbara Kruger, often rendered in a palette of red, white and black, have been delivering punchy political messages for decades. Using the language of contemporary publications, graphic design, or magazines, she aims to instigate a reconsideration of one’s immediate context. Barbara Kruger’s monumental wall work “Untitled (Questions)” (1990/2018) has reinstalled at MOCA in Los Angeles. The emblematic red, white, and blue artwork was originally commissioned by the Museum in 1989 for the exhibition “A Forest of Signs: Art in the Crisis of Representation”*, and was last installed in 1990 on the south wall of MOCA’s building. The work holds an iconic place in the collective memory of Los Angeles’s art community and is considered one of the museum’s curatorial highlights over its 40-year history. Measuring 9.15 x 58.22 meter in size “Untitled (Questions)” it is a work of text art which includes questions tackling the issues of patriotism, civic engagement and power relations: “Who is beyond the law?”, “Who is bought and sold?”, “Who is free to choose?” “Who does the time?”, “Who follows orders?”, “Who Salutes longest?”, “Who prays loudest?”, “Who dies first?” and “Who laughs last?”. In a design inspired by the U.S. flag, these nine questions are rendered in capital letters in lieu of stripes. Created in an important social and political moment of 1990, when, among other things, the U.S. was heading toward a war with Iraq led by President George H.W. Bush, the work remains as relevant as ever.
*The exhibition “A Forest of Signs: Art in the Crisis of Representation ” (7/5-13/8/1989) featured the work of 30 artists. The oldest of the artists featured was born in 1944, the youngest in 1956. So the artists were quite young; their art is the art of the 1980s. Each artist was then given two large pages to show a selection of his or her work.
Info: MOCA, Geffen Contemporary, 152 North Central Avenue, Los Angeles, Duration: 20/10/18-30/11/20, www.moca.org
