The Last Picture Show: Artists Using Photography, 1960-1982
March 11 through June 12, 2005
Miami Art Central
5960 SW 57 Avenue in South Miami
T 305.455.3333
A comet sculpted from a series of photos, an absurd fashion show constructed entirely of sausages, pictures of other famous pictures, a whip made out of passport photos of an artist making faces – what makes these photographic presentations works of art? How is the unique gesture of the artist communicated through the mechanical practice of photography? How have artists transformed our understanding of photography through their experimental uses of the medium? These are some of the questions explored in the exhibition The Last Picture Show: Artists Using Photography, 1960-1982, on view at Miami Art Central March 11 through June 12, 2005.
While artists today feel just as comfortable picking up a camera as they do a paintbrush, this has not always been the case. How did photography become an increasingly popular medium of choice by artists of all generations regardless of their primary form of expression? Focusing on a roughly 20-year period of history, The Last Picture Show attempts to answer this question by bringing together more than 200 photographic works by 57 international artists. Each artist took up the camera as a tool in pursuit of a diverse range of artistic experiments that provocatively intersected with the realms of sculpture, painting, and performance.
Cutting a historical path across a wide range of art practices and movements such as Conceptual Art, Minimalism, Arte Povera, and strategies of image appropriation, The Last Picture Show traces the development of conceptual uses of this medium. The exhibition encompasses photography’s first glimmerings in the 1960s in the work of artists such as Bernd and Hilla Becher, Bruce Nauman, and Edward Ruscha to its rise to art-world prominence in the work of the photo-based artists of the late 1970s and early 1980s, including Sherrie Levine, Richard Prince, and Cindy Sherman.
The scope of their subjects is diverse and each of the artists in the exhibition has used the camera to frame critical explorations of a range of issues. These include the tradition of self-portraiture, the body, landscape, the architecture of the built environment, photography’s relationship to painting and sculpture, the intersection of language and vision, and the impact of advertising and mass media.
The artists featured in The Last Picture Show are: Vito Acconci, Bas Jan Ader, Giovanni Anselmo, Eleanor Antin, John Baldessari, Bernd and Hilla Becher, Joseph Beuys, Mel Bochner, Christian Boltanski, Marcel Broodthaers, Victor Burgin, Sarah Charlesworth, Bruce Conner, Jan Dibbets, Valie Export, Hans-Peter Feldmann, Peter Fischli and David Weiss, Gilbert and George, Dan Graham, Hans Haacke, Douglas Huebler, Yves Klein, Imi Knoebel, Silvia Kolbowski, Barbara Kruger, David Lamelas, Louise Lawler, Sherrie Levine, Sol LeWitt, Richard Long, Gordon Matta-Clark, Ana Mendieta, Nasreen Mohamedi, Bruce Nauman, Hélio Oiticica and Neville D’Almeida, Dennis Oppenheim, Giulio Paolini, Giuseppe Penone, Adrian Piper, Sigmar Polke, Richard Prince, Charles Ray, Martha Rosler, Allen Ruppersberg, Edward Ruscha, Cindy Sherman, Laurie Simmons, Robert Smithson, Ger Van Elk, Andy Warhol, William Wegman, James Welling, and Hannah Wilke.
Catalogue
An accompanying exhibition catalogue contains essays by Geoffrey Batchen, Kate Bush, Douglas Fogle, Stefan Gronert, Pamela Lee, and Melanie Marino as well as seminal historical texts by Vito Acconci, Lawrence Alloway, Douglas Crimp, Nancy Foote, Dan Graham, Robert Smithson, and Jeff Wall. The fully illustrated catalogue will be available at Miami Art Central.
Images
Select exhibition images are available upon request. Please contact Milagros Yanes at 305-455-3331 or milagros@miamiartcentral.org.
Tour The Last Picture Show: Artists Using Photography, 1960-1982 was organized by the Walker Art Center. The show was curated by Walker associate curator Douglas Fogle. Following its Minneapolis run, the show traveled to Los Angeles. Funding is made possible by generous support from Karen and Ken Heithoff, La Coleccion Jumex, Carol and Judson Bemis, Jr., and Harry M. Drake.
Miami Art Central’s presentation of this exhibition is sponsored by the Cisneros Fontanals Art Foundation.
MIAMI ART CENTRAL
Emerging in Miami’s thriving art community, MAC is a not for profit institution dedicated to the support and encouragement of international contemporary art and culture. MAC aims to be a truly distinct and unique institution and an alternative and experimental space for the arts.
Located at 5960 SW 57 Avenue in South Miami and founded in 2003, the organization is recognized for its distinguished exhibitions of contemporary art. Support for Miami Art Central is provided by the Cisneros Fontanals Art Foundation. The museum is open Tuesday through Sunday from noon to 7 p.m. For more information about Miami Art Central call 305.455.3333 or visit our web site at www.miamiartcentral.org
