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Jenny Holzer (1950, US)

Artist Rank (2007): 70 +

Most exhibitions in:
USA	70

Most exhibitions with:
Name	Rank	№
Bruce Nauman	3	35
Andy Warhol	1	33
Cindy Sherman	7	31
Barbara Kruger	170	27
Louise Bourgeois	11	25

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Jenny HOLZER (1950)

"With Bleeding inside the head there is a metallic taste at t", , Metal (BELGIUM)

Biography

1950
Born in Gallipolis, OH (US)
Since the late 1970s, when her aphoristic Truisms and her Inflammatory Essays were first posted anonymously around New York, Jenny Holzer´s work has sought to reformulate many of the givens of traditional art, especially in the context of public spaces. Writing is the basis of Holzer´s practice. Although most of Holzer´s content is original, on occasion, she works with historic or archival sources (for example, in her several commissioned permanent memorial works). To date she has written thirteen series: Truisms (1977-79), Inflammatory Essays (1979-82), Living (1980-82), Survival (1983-85), Under a Rock (1986), Laments (1989) Mother and Child (1990), War (1992), Lustmord (1993-95), Erlauf (1995), Arno (1996), Blue (1998), and OH (2001).

Holzer employs her texts singly or in combination in her permanent works, installations and xenon projections. Media employed in Holzer´s practice vary. Writing is programmed into electronic signs; printed on posters and t-shirts; carved in sandstone benches, marble floors and granite sarcophagi; cast as bronze plaques; or etched on silver. Further, her statements have appeared on billboards, movie marquees, automobiles, in news magazines, and on websites, as well as being projected onto facades, walls, water and mountainsides by laser or with xenon.

Holzer´s work has been shown in exhibitions and projects worldwide, including Times Square, New York (1982), Dia Art Foundation, New York (1989), Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York (1989), 44th Venice Biennale (1990), Art Tower, Mito, Japan (1994), Centre National d´Art et de la Culture Georges Pompidou, Paris (1996), Museum of Modern Art, New York (1997), Instituto Cultural Itau, Sao Paolo, Brazil (1998), Whitney Museum of American Art, New York (1999), Oslo Museum of Contemporary Art, Norway (2000), and Neue Nationalgalerie Berlin, Germany (2001). In addition, she has executed permanent installations for institutions such as MAK, Vienna (1993), Toyota Municipal Museum of Art, Japan (1995), Hamburger Kunsthalle, Germany (1996), Guggenheim Museum Bilbao, Spain (1997), and Bundestag, Berlin (1999), as well as created memorials including, Black Garden, Nordhorn, Germany, (1994), Peace Monument, Erlauf, Austria (1995), Goerdeler Memorial, City of Leipzig (1999), and BLACKLIST, University of Southern California, Los Angeles (1999).

Holzer was born on July 29, 1950, in Gallipolis, Ohio. After attending high school in Ohio and Florida, she enrolled in Duke University´s liberal arts program in 1968 and later attended the University of Chicago from 1970 to 1971. In 1972, Holzer completed her undergraduate work at Ohio University, Athens, with a bachelor´s degree in fine arts. In 1975, she entered the master of fine arts program at the Rhode Island School of Design. During her MFA studies, completed in 1977, Holzer moved to New York City to participate in the Whitney Museum´s Independent Study Program, and began her first series of public art texts. Holzer received the Leone d´Oro grand prize for best pavilion at the 44th Venice Biennale in 1990, the Skowhegan Medal for Installation from the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture, in 1994, the Crystal Award from the World Economic Forum, in 1996 and a Berlin Prize Fellowship from the American Academy in Berlin, 2000. Ohio University awarded her an honorary Doctorate of Arts in 1994 and Williams College awarded her an honorary Doctorate of Arts in 2000. Jenny Holzer lives and works in Hoosick, New York.

She is represented by Cheim and Read, New York; Monika Spruth Galerie, Cologne; and Galerie Yvon Lambert, Paris.

Public exhibitions 203