Barbara Kruger

The Great Women Artists

Katy Hessel

Arts

4.8 • 877 Ratings

🗓️ 31 January 2024

⏱️ 45 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

THIS WEEK on the GWA Podcast, @katy.hessel interviews is one of the world's most influential artists: Barbara Kruger. Hailed for her distinctive poster-style language, Kruger merges text and image to bring attention to urgent political concerns. Bold, loud and readily available, her tabloid-esque works confront everyday issues. And, evocative of advertising, have the ability to bring meaning to often meaningless signage. Born in Newark, NJ, and educated at Syracuse then Parsons, where she was taught by the late great Diane Arbus, Kruger began as an art director for Condé Nast, where she shaped her visual language. As she has said, “I had the luxury of working with the best technology ... I became attached to sans serif type, especially Futura and Helvetica, which I chose because they could really cut through the grease.” Fast forward to the 1970s and 80s – a highly political moment in America: especially for the control over one’s body – and Kruger is culminating text/images that speak to Laura Mulvey’s landmark 1975 essay on the male gaze, “Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema", and that protest anti abortion laws. Her work defined a new type of art that directly addressed power and control, championing the rights we should have over our bodies, life and world. Today, she is still at the forefront with her work – immersive and on the wall – that feels familiar due to its evocation of the machine we know as capitalism, that both drives us and that we drive. For those lucky enough to be in London, Kruger is very excitingly having her first institutional show in London in over 20 years, at Serpentine Galleries: Thinking of You. I Mean Me. I Mean You. Opening TODAY, until 17 March 2024. -- THIS EPISODE IS GENEROUSLY SUPPORTED BY THE LEVETT COLLECTION: https://www.instagram.com/famm.mougins // https://www.merrellpublishers.com/9781858947037 ENJOY!!! Follow us: Katy Hessel: @thegreatwomenartists / @katy.hessel Sound editing by Nada Smiljanic Music by Ben Wetherfield

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	Hello everyone and welcome back to series 10 of the Great Women Artists podcast.
0:05.9	I am so excited to say that this series is supported by the Levit Collection,
0:10.6	a vast and varied art collection of which a major portion is dedicated to fantastic works by women artists.
0:17.4	The Levit Collection's support for women in the arts is such that preparations are in full swing for the creation of the new museum, FAMM, FAMM, which will be opening in June 24 in Mujan in the south of France.
0:31.6	It will be the first major museum in mainland Europe dedicated to solely female artists and will exhibit a myriad of
0:39.5	artworks all from the collection. Impressionist, surrealist, modern and contemporary art created by women
0:45.8	from around the world will take pride of place in the Levitt's new museum, female artists of the
0:50.8	Mujan Museum. But in the meantime, stay tuned by following at fam.m.m
0:56.1	and don't miss the beautiful book, Abstract Expressionists, The Women, published by Marelle,
1:01.4	which presents a selection of works from the collection, alongside richly illustrated essays by
1:06.2	scholars LNG Landau and Joan M. Martyr, all available now. I hope you enjoy this episode.
1:17.0	Hello everyone and welcome to The Great Women Artist podcast with me, Katie Hessel.
1:25.2	Some of you might know me from The Great Women Artists. An Instagram account,
1:28.6	I set up in October 2015, which celebrates female artists on a daily basis, ranging from
1:34.3	young graduates to old masters. Well, in a similar fashion to the Instagram, this podcast is
1:40.5	all about celebrating female artists from a variety of backgrounds and histories.
1:45.0	And I am so excited to be interviewing artists on their career or artists, writers, curators or general art lovers on the women artist who means most of them.
1:54.0	What I want this podcast to do is celebrate female artists in all different capacities so you, the listener, can gain a look
2:02.1	into the greatest female artists working now or from art history.
2:09.1	I am so excited to say that my guest on the Great Women Artist podcast
2:13.2	is one of the most influential artists in the world today, Barbara Kruger.
2:18.5	Hailed for her distinctive red, white, green and black poster-style language,
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Katy Hessel, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of Katy Hessel and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.