Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger, Untitled (Your body is a battleground), 1989
Courtesy The Broad Art Foundation, Los Angeles

 

Barbara Kruger (*1945) is an artist who works with pictures and words in the hopes of revealing and resisting socially ingrained assumptions about power: how it determines who lives and who dies, who is healed and who is housed, who speaks and who is silenced, who is visible and who is marginalized. Since the mid-1970s, she has juxtaposed her own texts with found images in her effort to expose the machinations of capitalism, politics and gender that often go unquestioned. Based in Los Angeles and New York, Kruger has been with the gallery since 1985, represented first by Galerie Monika Sprüth and later by Sprüth Magers.

 

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The artist’s oeuvre spans photomontages and complex video and sound projects, as well as installations in the public realm. Frequently working outside the bounds of the museum or art gallery, Kruger has always managed to find new ways to reach the public, from traditional pictorial formats to vast architectural installations that transform the walls, ceilings and floors of entire spaces. Her works may appear in magazines and newspapers, the kind of light boxes usually reserved for advertising, T-shirts, posters, shopping bags, billboards, LED displays, displays on buses and in train stations, and on building facades.

Kruger’s texts—often in black or white lettering with brightly colored backgrounds, most often red—can become image elements in their own right. They take the form of evocative statements (“I shop therefore I am,” “Your body is a battleground,” “We don’t need another hero”), questions (“Do I have to give up me to be loved by you?”; “Who will write the history of tears?”) and suggestive declarations (“Put your money where your mouth is”; “You are not yourself”). When words pictures appear together, the texts dismantle the found image’s pictorial plane, making room for an abundance of echoes, effects, contradictions and implications.

Kruger’s emphatically visual conceptual practice draws on the aesthetics of graphic design and magazines (a field in which she briefly worked early in her career), 1970s punk posters and album covers. It plays with ideas informing the language-based conceptual art of the 1960s and 1970s, including those underpinning text and image works by artists such as John Baldessari, Jenny Holzer and Ed Ruscha, and it adds to the art historical legacy of German Dadaism and Soviet agitprop art by El Lissitzky and Aleksander Rodchenko. Perhaps the biggest difference between Kruger and her predecessors is her strategy of subversive mimicry: Kruger uses the dominant advertising media of late capitalist consumer society to criticize its patriarchal structures, its hierarchies and dynamics, effectively supplanting the innate purposes of these media with her own singular project.

Her works are political without trying to persuade viewers to adopt any particular system or ideology. Instead they invoke and rattle positions viewers might take innately on account of their gender, social class, nationality, religion, or age, confronting them with often repressed feelings of powerlessness, ignorance, anger, fear, or greed. They exploit the immediacy of images and texts, and the unconscious and semi-conscious reactions evoked in the beholder, and they upend social stereotypes by forcing viewers to consider them in a new light. They are as seductive as successful advertising and as effective as propaganda. Ultimately Kruger subverts systems of cultural representation, turning it back on itself.

 

Barbara Kruger: Part of the Discourse
Performa, New York 2017
From Art21’s Extended Play series, 2018
Courtesy Art21, art21.org, founded 1997

 

Catalogue Raisonné

 

Sprüth Magers is supporting a call for works to complement the Barbara Kruger Catalogue Raisonné, an ongoing project documenting the artist’s entire oeuvre.

This call for information invites collectors, galleries and institutions who own an artwork by Barbara Kruger to submit relevant informations and image documentation, thus providing an essential contribution to the provenance research into her work.

Link

 

Works
Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Your body is a battleground), 1989/2019

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Your body is a battleground)
Single-channel video on LED panel, sound, 1 min. 4 sec
350.1 × 350.1 cm
137 7/8 × 137 7/8 inches

More views
Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Don't), 2023

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Don't), 2023
Archival pigment print
101.6 × 152.4 cm
40 × 60 inches
105.7 × 156.2 × 5.1 cm (framed)
41 5/8 × 61 1/2 × 2 inches (framed)
Edition of 10 + 3 AP

More views
Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Please), 2023

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Please), 2023
Archival pigment print
101.6 × 152.4 cm
40 × 60 inches
105.7 × 156.2 × 5.1 cm (framed)
41 5/8 × 61 1/2 × 2 inches (framed)
Edition of 10 + 3 AP

More views
Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Questions), 1990/2018

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Questions), 1990/2018
Monumental wall work
On view October 20, 2018–November 2020 at The Geffen Contemporary at MOCA
Photo: Elon Schoenholz

More views
Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Remember me), 1988/2020

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Remember me)
Single-channel video on LED panel, sound, 23 sec.
350.1 × 250.1 cm
137 7/8 × 98 1/2 inches

More views
Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Our Leader), 1987/2020

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Our Leader)
Single-channel video on LED panel, sound, 24 sec.
350.1 × 200.1 cm
137 7/8 × 78 3/4 inches

More views
Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Blind idealism is...), High Line, NY, 2016

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Blind idealism is…)
High Line, New York, 2016
Photo: Timothy Schenck. Courtesy of Friends of the High Line

More views
Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Too big to fail), 2012

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Too big to fail), 2012
Digital print on vinyl
274.3 × 274.3 × 6 cm
108 × 108 × 2 3/8 inches

Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Truth), 2013

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Truth), 2013
Digital print on vinyl
178.6 × 292.1 cm
70 1/3 × 115 inches

Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Who owns what?), 1991/2012

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Who owns what?), 1991/2012
Digital print on vinyl
292.1 × 279.4 cm
115 × 110 inches

Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Feel is something you do with your hands), 2020

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Feel is something you do with your hands)
Digital print on vinyl
201.5 × 329.9 cm
79 1/3 × 129 7/8 inches

More views
Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Admit nothing/Blame everyone/Be bitter), 1987/2020

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Admit nothing/Blame everyone/Be bitter)
Single-channel video on LED panel, sound, 17 sec.
200.1 × 400.2 cm
78 3/4 × 157 1/2 inches

More views
Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger
Belief + Doubt, Hirshhorn Museum, Washington, 2012

Barbara Kruger
Belief + Doubt, 2012
Print on vinyl
Installation at Hirshhorn Museum, Washington, D.C., since 2012

Photo: Cathy Carver. Courtesy of the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden

More views
Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger
Untitled (You, Me, We), 2003

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (You, Me, We), 2003
Chromogenic print on archival paper
155 × 124 cm
61 × 48 7/8 inches

Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Now you see us / Now you don’t), 1987

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Now you see us / Now you don’t), 1987
Gelatin silver print on paper
116.2 × 137.2 cm
45 3/4 × 54 inches

Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger
Untitled (No Comment), 2020

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (No Comment)
Three-channel video installation, color, sound, 9 min. 25 sec.

More views
Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger
Untitled (We are all that heaven allows), 1984

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (We are all that heaven allows)
Gelatin silver print on paper
186 × 120 cm
73 1/4 × 47 1/4 inches

Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Your life is a perpetual insomnia), 1984

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Your life is a perpetual insomnia)
Gelatin silver print
182 × 117 cm
71 5/8 × 46 inches

Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Never Perfect Enough), 2020

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Never Perfect Enough)
Digital prints on vinyl, 3 parts
each 365.8 × 281.6 cm
each 144 × 110 7/8 inches

More views
Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Who is born to lose?), 1990

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Who is born to lose?)
Gelatin silver print in artist's frame
251.5 × 102.8 cm
99 × 40.5 inches

More views
Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Who is free to choose?), 1990

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Who is free to choose?)
Gelatin silver print in artist's frame
251.5 × 102.8 cm
99 × 40.5 inches

More views
Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger
Untitled (If you want a picture), 2017

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (If you want a picture), 2017
Digital print on vinyl
274.3 × 170.2 × 5.1 cm
108 × 67 × 2 inches

Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Let go), 2003

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Let go), 2003
Chromogenic dye coupler print
152.4 × 228.6 cm
60 × 90 inches
Edition of 5

More views
Details

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Your body is a battleground)
Single-channel video on LED panel, sound, 1 min. 4 sec
350.1 × 350.1 cm
137 7/8 × 137 7/8 inches

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Your body is a battleground), 1989/2019
Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Your body is a battleground) (video stills)

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Your body is a battleground), 1989/2019
Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Your body is a battleground)

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Your body is a battleground), 1989/2019
Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Don't), 2023
Archival pigment print
101.6 × 152.4 cm
40 × 60 inches
105.7 × 156.2 × 5.1 cm (framed)
41 5/8 × 61 1/2 × 2 inches (framed)
Edition of 10 + 3 AP

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Don't), 2023
Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Don't), 2023 (detail)

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Don't), 2023
Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Don't), 2023

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Don't), 2023
Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Please), 2023
Archival pigment print
101.6 × 152.4 cm
40 × 60 inches
105.7 × 156.2 × 5.1 cm (framed)
41 5/8 × 61 1/2 × 2 inches (framed)
Edition of 10 + 3 AP

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Please), 2023
Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Please), 2023 (detail)

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Please), 2023
Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Please), 2023

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Please), 2023
Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Questions), 1990/2018
Monumental wall work
On view October 20, 2018–November 2020 at The Geffen Contemporary at MOCA
Photo: Elon Schoenholz

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Questions), 1990/2018
Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Questions), 1990
Monumental wall work first presented at The Geffen Contemporary at MOCA in 1990

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Questions), 1989 - 2018
Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Questions), 1990/2018 (detail)

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Questions), 1990/2018

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Remember me)
Single-channel video on LED panel, sound, 23 sec.
350.1 × 250.1 cm
137 7/8 × 98 1/2 inches

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Remember me), 1988/2020
Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Remember me) (video stills)

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Remember me), 1988/2020
Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Remember me) (scale image)

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Remember me), 1988/2020

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Our Leader)
Single-channel video on LED panel, sound, 24 sec.
350.1 × 200.1 cm
137 7/8 × 78 3/4 inches

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Our Leader), 1987/2020
Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Our Leader) (detail)

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Our Leader), 1987/2020
Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Our Leader) (scale image)

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Our Leader), 1987/2020
Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Blind idealism is…)
High Line, New York, 2016
Photo: Timothy Schenck. Courtesy of Friends of the High Line

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Blind idealism is...), High Line, NY, 2016
Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Blind idealism is…), 2016 (detail)

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Blind idealism is...), 2016
Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Blind idealism is…), 2016 (detail)

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Blind idealism is...), 2016
Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Too big to fail), 2012
Digital print on vinyl
274.3 × 274.3 × 6 cm
108 × 108 × 2 3/8 inches

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Too big to fail), 2012
Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Truth), 2013
Digital print on vinyl
178.6 × 292.1 cm
70 1/3 × 115 inches

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Truth), 2013
Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Who owns what?), 1991/2012
Digital print on vinyl
292.1 × 279.4 cm
115 × 110 inches

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Who owns what?), 1991/2012
Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Feel is something you do with your hands)
Digital print on vinyl
201.5 × 329.9 cm
79 1/3 × 129 7/8 inches

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Feel is something you do with your hands), 2020
Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Feel is something you do with your hands) (scale image)

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Feel is something you do with your hands), 2020

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Admit nothing/Blame everyone/Be bitter)
Single-channel video on LED panel, sound, 17 sec.
200.1 × 400.2 cm
78 3/4 × 157 1/2 inches

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Admit nothing/Blame everyone/Be bitter), 1987/2020
Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Admit nothing/Blame everyone/Be bitter) (video stills)

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Admit nothing/Blame everyone/Be bitter), 1987/2020
Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Admit nothing/Blame everyone/Be bitter) (scale image)

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Admit nothing/Blame everyone/Be bitter), 1987/2020
Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger
Belief + Doubt, 2012
Print on vinyl
Installation at Hirshhorn Museum, Washington, D.C., since 2012

Photo: Cathy Carver. Courtesy of the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden

Barbara Kruger
Belief + Doubt, Hirshhorn Museum, Washington, 2012
Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger
Belief + Doubt, 2012
Print on vinyl
Installation at Hirshhorn Museum, Washington, D.C., since 2012

Photo: Cathy Carver. Courtesy of the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden

Barbara Kruger
Belief + Doubt, 2012
Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (You, Me, We), 2003
Chromogenic print on archival paper
155 × 124 cm
61 × 48 7/8 inches

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (You, Me, We), 2003
Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Now you see us / Now you don’t), 1987
Gelatin silver print on paper
116.2 × 137.2 cm
45 3/4 × 54 inches

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Now you see us / Now you don’t), 1987

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (No Comment)
Three-channel video installation, color, sound, 9 min. 25 sec.

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (No Comment), 2020
Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (No Comment) (installation view)

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (No Comment), 2020
Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (No Comment) (installation view)

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (No Comment), 2020
Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (No Comment) (installation view)

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (No Comment), 2020
Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (No Comment) (installation view)

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (No Comment), 2020
Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (No Comment) (installation view)

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (No Comment), 2020
Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (We are all that heaven allows)
Gelatin silver print on paper
186 × 120 cm
73 1/4 × 47 1/4 inches

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (We are all that heaven allows), 1984
Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Your life is a perpetual insomnia)
Gelatin silver print
182 × 117 cm
71 5/8 × 46 inches

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Your life is a perpetual insomnia), 1984
Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Never Perfect Enough)
Digital prints on vinyl, 3 parts
each 365.8 × 281.6 cm
each 144 × 110 7/8 inches

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Never Perfect Enough), 2020
Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Never Perfect Enough) (detail)

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Never Perfect Enough)
Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Never Perfect Enough) (detail)

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Never Perfect Enough)
Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Never Perfect Enough) (detail)

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Never Perfect Enough)
Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Never Perfect Enough)

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Never Perfect Enough), 2020
Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Never Perfect Enough) (installation view)

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Never Perfect Enough), 2020
Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Who is born to lose?)
Gelatin silver print in artist's frame
251.5 × 102.8 cm
99 × 40.5 inches

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Who is born to lose?), 1990
Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Who is born to lose?) (detail)

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Who is born to lose?), 1990
Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Who is born to lose?) (detail)

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Who is born to lose?), 1990
Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Who is free to choose?)
Gelatin silver print in artist's frame
251.5 × 102.8 cm
99 × 40.5 inches

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Who is free to choose?), 1990
Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Who is free to choose?) (detail)

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Who is free to choose?), 1990
Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Who is free to choose?) (detail)

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Who is free to choose?), 1990
Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (If you want a picture), 2017
Digital print on vinyl
274.3 × 170.2 × 5.1 cm
108 × 67 × 2 inches

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (If you want a picture), 2017
Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Let go), 2003
Chromogenic dye coupler print
152.4 × 228.6 cm
60 × 90 inches
Edition of 5

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Let go), 2003
Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Let go), 2003 (detail)

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Let go), 2003
Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Let go), 2003 (detail)

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Let go), 2003
Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Let go), 2003 (installation view)

Barbara Kruger
Untitled (Let go), 2003
Details
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1 of 23

 

Current and Upcoming
Barbara Kruger
John Baldessari, Buildings=Guns=People: Desire, Knowledge, And Hope (With Smog), 1986. Courtesy the Broad

Desire, Knowledge, and Hope (With Smog).
Group Exhibition
The Broad, Los Angeles
Through April 7, 2024

The Broad is pleased to announce Desire, Knowledge, and Hope (with Smog), an exhibition drawn entirely from the Broad collection, showcasing works by Los Angeles based-artists. Drawing its title from a John Baldessari work, the exhibition includes reflections on L.A. as a city in flux and turmoil, and on societal issues that extend far beyond the city. Originally the exhibition was a Spring 2020 show poised to open when the COVID-19 pandemic emerged, leaving the project unrealized. Now re-envisioned, Desire, Knowledge, and Hope (with Smog) mines the paradoxes captured in Baldessari’s title through a more expansive, post-2020 lens featuring a wider spectrum of LA-based artists and practices in the evolving Broad collection.

Link

Barbara Kruger
SILENT WRITINGS, 2009/2024
Outernet Arts, London
Through April 22, 2024 (every Monday: 6–9pm)

Outernet Arts and Serpentine continue an innovative partnership presenting a digital artwork Silent Writings by American artist Barbara Kruger that explores how we communicate and connect with each other.

In Silent Writings, 2009/2024, Barbara Kruger explores how we communicate and connect with global events and with each other. The piece weaves images and words in an attempt to engage issues of control, power and dominance. Kruger incorporates her own words alongside quotes from writers and philosophers including Aimé Césaire, Goethe, Thomas Mann and Mary Therese McCarthy. These quotes touch on themes of violence, political modes of operation and spectatorship. Kruger manipulates selected words, enlarging or removing them to highlight their meanings and create new ones.

Link
Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger, Silent Writings, 2009/2024 (artwork still)
Courtesy of Outernet Arts
Barbara Kruger
Installation view, Long Story Short, MOCA Grand Avenue, Courtesy The Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles (MOCA). Photo: Jeff McLane

Long Story Short
Group Exhibition
Museum of Contemporary Art Los Angeles – MOCA, Los Angeles
Through April 28, 2024

This exhibition demonstrates the myriad ways contemporary artists have addressed aesthetic, political, and philosophical concerns in the last fifty years, whether by reclaiming public space in guerilla-style street performances, innovating new forms, commemorating loves and losses, challenging the hierarchy of art and craft, or rethinking the conventions of portraiture. By exhibiting artworks that are widely regarded as hallmarks of the museum’s collection, alongside lesser-known pieces, recent acquisitions, and artworks that have never previously been on view at MOCA, Long Story Short reminds us that art history, and history more broadly, is made in the present.

Link

Script Girls
Group Exhibition
Musée Champollion – Les Écritures du Monde, Figeac
Through May 26, 2024

In a male-dominated society where women’s voices have long been confined to the domestic sphere, writing appears to be a means of transgression and a vector of emancipation. Language is not neutral, but a means of self-assertion. Writing is thus an important element in the fight for women’s rights. The use of the written word in art by women artists is therefore not insignificant, and reflects a number of questions and struggles that go far beyond feminism. Featuring works of 23 artists of different nationalities, including Annette Messager, Sophie Calle, Jenny Holzer, Nil Yalter, Vera Molnar and the Guerilla Girls, Script Girls explores at the act of writing in the work of women artists from the 1970s to the present day.

Link
Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger, Untitled (Memory is your image of perfection), 1984
© Barbara Kruger, 2024
Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger, Untitled (We will no longer be seen and not heard), 1985
Courtesy the artist, Blanton Museum of Art. Photo: Manny Alcala

Day Jobs
Group Exhibition
Cantor Arts Center, Stanford
Through July 21, 2024

One of the typical measures of success for artists is the ability to quit their day jobs and focus full time on making art. Yet these roles are not always an impediment to an artist’s career. This exhibition, which includes the work of Richard Artschwager, Gretchen Bender, Barbara Kruger and Frank Stella, among many others, illuminates how day jobs can spur creative growth by providing artists with unexpected new materials and methods, working knowledge of a specific industry that becomes an area of artistic interest or critique, or a predictable structure that opens space for unpredictable ideas.

Link

How language constructs the World
Group Exhibition
Bündner Museum, Chur
Through July 28, 2024

The linguistic and cultural landscape of Graubünden serves as the starting point for the exhibition How Language Constructs the World. The Bündner Kunstmuseum thus takes up a major theme of human culture and localises this regional characteristic in a global context. By focussing on a selection of works by national and international artists as well as historical artefacts from Graubünden, the importance of language and narrative in community and society is highlighted.

Link
Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger, Untitled (Only the unborn have your right to life), 1986
Barbara Kruger
Transmissions: Selections from the Marciano Collection, installation view, 2024
Courtesy the Marciano Art Foundation. Photo: Heather Rasmussen

Transmissions: Selections from the Marciano Collection
Group Exhibition
Marciano Art Foundation, Los Angeles
Through February 2025

Curated by Hanneke Skerath and Douglas Fogle, this exhibition brings together works from the Marciano Collection, a collection that seeks to communicate and respond to the most historically significant developments in art history and human society, while continuously considering current socio-political conditions and contemporary visual culture. This presentation will include works by artists including Louise Lawler, Rosemarie Trockel and Kaari Upson.

Link
Exhibitions at Sprüth Magers
Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger
April 12–May 18, 2024
London

The razor-sharp, witty and unmistakable work of Barbara Kruger explores the power of image and word and touches on the dynamics of control, class, corruption and consumerism. For over four decades, her voice and aesthetic have transcended the insularity of the art world and influenced everyday visual culture. Monika Sprüth and Philomene Magers are pleased to present an exhibition of new works by Kruger at the London gallery. The artist’s most recent text-based wall work and series of vinyls will be set in dialogue with a group of “paste-ups”—collages from the 1980s related to some of her early and best-known works.

Mondi Possibili
Henni Alftan, John Baldessari, Cao Fei, Thomas Demand, Thea Djordjadze, Lucy Dodd, Robert Elfgen, Peter Fischli David Weiss, Sylvie Fleury, Jenny Holzer, Donald Judd, Karen Kilimnik, Barbara Kruger, Louise Lawler, David Ostrowski, Michail Pirgelis, Sterling Ruby, Thomas Scheibitz, Andreas Schulze, Hyun-Sook Song, Robert Therrien, Rosemarie Trockel, Kaari Upson, Andrea Zittel
August 31–September 14, 2023
Seoul

Mondi Possibili highlights the interplay between art and design and explores the many ways in which experimentation with material, technique and scale can reveal the hidden narratives, quiet drama and humor in the everyday items that furnish our lives as well as our imaginations. Connected through a paradigm of the possible, all artworks on show examine familiar objects – citing, celebrating, adapting or appropriating them – offering surprising, playful or unsettling approaches that open up a range of “possible worlds.” This will be the fourth edition of Sprüth Magers’ Mondi Possibili – first titled by Pasquale Leccese – showcasing significant themes in the selected artists’ works as well as the gallery’s longstanding heritage. Its three previous iterations were presented in 1989, 2006 and 2007 in Cologne, where the gallery’s history is firmly rooted, and art and design have intersected for many decades.

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Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger

Sprüth Magers x Artadia

A Benefit Exhibition to Support the Next Generation of Artists
Thea Djordjadze, Lucy Dodd, Karen Kilimnik, Barbara Kruger, Louise Lawler, Pamela Rosenkranz, Analia Saban, Rosemarie Trockel
April 4–April 22, 2023
New York

Bringing together a group of outstanding female artists in an innovative and collaborative effort to support the next generation, Sprüth Magers is pleased to announce a benefit exhibition to raise funds for the non-profit organization Artadia. Through grantmaking, community-building and advocacy, Artadia strengthens the invaluable role visual artists play in our society.

The exhibition comprises influential contemporary voices across multiple generations, reflecting both the discourse on art, gender and power that is firmly embedded in Sprüth Magers’ history and its enduring support of pioneering female figures. Featured will be works by artists who are all part of the gallery’s dynamic roster, including Thea Djordjadze, Lucy Dodd, Karen Kilimnik, Barbara Kruger, Louise Lawler, Pamela Rosenkranz, Analia Saban and Rosemarie Trockel. All funds raised will go towards the impactful Artadia Awards program.

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Barbara Kruger
March 19–July 16, 2022
Los Angeles

Timed with her major survey exhibition at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, traveling from the Art Institute of Chicago and opening in March 2022, the Los Angeles gallery is pleased to present an exhibition of recent and historical works by Barbara Kruger.

Based in Los Angeles and New York, and celebrated internationally for her powerful, gut-wrenching words and images, Kruger continues to use strategies borrowed from mass media to call into question values and belief systems long engrained within contemporary culture. 

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Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger

GO FIGURE!?
Henni Alftan, John Baldessari, Cao Fei, George Condo, Diane Dal-Pra, Thomas Demand, Alex Foxton, Lenz Geerk, Elizabeth Glaessner, Matthew Angelo Harrison, Oscar yi Hou, Gary Hume, Clementine Keith-Roach, Karen Kilimnik, Barbara Kruger, Louise Lawler, Jo Messer, Pamela Rosenkranz, Sterling Ruby, Thomas Scheibitz, Cindy Sherman, Rosemarie Trockel, Kara Walker, Andro Wekua
May 19–May 26, 2021

GO FIGURE!? is an online exhibition in collaboration with Ed Tang and Jonathan Cheung. It presents works by artists from Sprüth Magers roster alongside a selection of emerging artists from around the globe and across various media, aiming to welcome a playful dialogue between the exhibiting artists and works.

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Barbara Kruger

Barbara Kruger
FOREVER
September 16, 2017–January 20, 2018
Berlin

Sprüth Magers presents FOREVER, a new site-specific work by Barbara Kruger. For this installation, which occupies all four walls and the floor of the Berlin gallery’s main exhibition space, the artist has created one of her immersive room-wraps and several new vinyl works. Their boldly designed textual statements on the nature of truth, power, belief and doubt embody the distinctive visual language that Kruger has developed over the course of her forty-year career.

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Eau de Cologne
Rosemarie Trockel, Cindy Sherman, Jenny Holzer, Barbara Kruger, Louise Lawler, Jenny Holzer / Lady Pink
June 28–August 20, 2016
Los Angeles

The group show Eau de Cologne at Sprüth Magers in Los Angeles features work from the late 1970s to 2016 by Jenny Holzer, Barbara Kruger, Louise Lawler, Cindy Sherman and Rosemarie Trockel. The exhibition at Sprüth Magers’ recently-opened Los Angeles gallery is a follow–up to its predecessor in Berlin last year. It sheds light on key topics in these artists’ works, but also the specific history of the gallery and its connection to these important female figures of an art that subtly addresses women’s roles in very different ways.

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Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger

Uneasy Angel / Imagine Los Angeles
Doug Aitken, John Baldessari, Patterson Beckwith, Lecia Dole-Recio, Jack Goldstein, Richard Hawkins, Patrick Hill, Sister Corita Kent, Norman M. Klein, Barbara Kruger, David Lamelas, John McCracken, Matthew Monahan, Lari Pittman, Sterling Ruby, Allen Ruppersberg, Lara Schnitger, Kim Schoenstadt, Paul Sietsema, Catherine Sullivan, Robert Therrien, Pae White
curated by Johannes Fricke Waldthausen
September 14–November 3, 2007
Munich

Uneasy Angel / Imagine Los Angeles is a thematic exhibition comprising the creative production of contemporary artists, writers, and filmmakers living and working in Los Angeles. In light of Umberto Eco’s and Jean Baudrillard’s notion of hyperreality, the exhibition perceives Los Angeles as just such a place—with unclear boundaries separating reality and the imaginary.

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20th Anniversary Show
John Baldessari, Alighiero Boetti, George Condo, Walter Dahn, Thomas Demand, Thea Djordjadze, Peter Fischli David Weiss, Sylvie Fleury, Andreas Gursky, Jenny Holzer, Gary Hume, Axel Kasseböhmer, Karen Kilimnik, Astrid Klein, Barbara Kruger, Louise Lawler, Jean-Luc Mylayne, Nina Pohl, Richard Prince, Ed Ruscha, Frances Scholz, Andreas Schulze, Cindy Sherman, Rosemarie Trockel, Andrea Zittel, Philip-Lorca diCorcia
April 25–October 18, 2003
Cologne

In 1983, Monika Sprüth opened her Cologne based gallery with a solo show by Andreas Schulze. Starting from the idea to establish a forum for young and unknown artists, the central focus of the gallery concept was developed in the discourse of the 80s. The gallery program was completed by recourses to artistic attitudes of the last 40 years. This research, motivated by reflection on contemporary art history, was more and more realized in cooperation with Philomene Magers who directed her Bonn gallery since 1992. After a few years of loose cooperation, Monika Sprüth Gallery and Philomene Magers Gallery aligned with each other after, and together the Monika Sprüth / Philomene Magers Gallery opened up in Munich in 1999.

Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger

Künstler der Galerie
Peter Fischli David Weiss, Rosemarie Trockel, George Condo, Axel Kasseböhmer, Cindy Sherman, Jenny Holzer, Barbara Kruger, Anne Loch, Andreas Schulze, Thomas Wachweger, Milan Kunc, Ina Barfuss
June 13–July 15, 1987
Cologne

Press

“As subtle as a brick in the face”: Barbara Kruger’s cacophonous Trumpspeak premonitions
The Guardian, article by Adrian Searle, January 31, 2024

Barbara Kruger: Speak Louder
Flash Art, article by Clem MacLeod, Spring 2024

“Feels Like Life” – An Interview with Barbara Kruger
The Drift, Online, interviewed by Rebecca Panovka and Kiara Barrow, October 20, 2022

Barbara Kruger: A Way With Words
The New York Times, Online, article by Roberta Smith, July 14, 2022

Barbara Kruger: Mother of Memes ?
Kunstforum International, article by Rosa Windt, January–February 2022

Barbara Kruger: Infinitely Copied, Still Unmatched
The New York Times, Online, article by Jon Caramanica, November 11, 2021

Barbara Kruger is still right about everything. Let’s listen up.
The Washington Post, Online, article by Philip Kennicott, October 4, 2021

Barbara Kruger: “Thank God I’m an artist and not a movie or Tiktok star”
The Art Newspaper, Online, interview by Jori Finkel, August 16, 2021

Barbara Kruger
The New York Times T Magazine, article by Megan O’Grady, October 19, 2020

The Artwork
The Gentlewoman, article by Christina Ruiz, Autumn and Winter 2020

“Auch ich fragte, was soll das?”
Die Zeit, article by Tobias Timm, September 2019

Barbara Kruger on Feminism, #MeToo And The Power Of Words
Tatler, article by Payal Uttam, March 25, 2019

In advance of the midterms, Barbara Kruger reprises MOCA mural that asks “Who is beyond the law?”
Los Angeles Times, article by Carolina A. Miranda, October 18, 2018

Barbara Kruger Forever: The essential artist talks Ikea, Trump, hypebeasts, sex, and power.
The Cut, article by Kat Stoeffel, February 2018

Barbara Kruger’s Supreme Performance
The New Yorker, article by Jamie Lauren Keiles, November 12, 2017

Land der Unsicherheit
Süddeutsche Zeitung, article by Catrin Lorch, October 13, 2017

These ’80s Artists Are More Important Than Ever
The New York Times, article by Gary Indiana, February 13, 2017

ON SITE: Barbara Kruger in Washington
Artforum, article by Bibiana Obler, February 2017

Biography

Barbara Kruger (*1945, Newark, NJ) lives and works in Los Angeles and New York. Solo shows include the Serpentine Gallery, London (2024), Museum of Modern Art, New York (2022), Los Angeles County Museum of Art (2022), Neue Nationalgalerie, Berlin (2022), The Art Institute of Chicago (2021), AMOREPACIFIC Museum of Art, Seoul (2019), National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC (2016), High Line Art, New York (2016), Modern Art Oxford (2014), Kunsthaus Bregenz (2013), Pinakothek der Moderne, Munich (2011), Schirn Kunsthalle, Frankfurt (2010), Gallery of Modern Art, Glasgow (2005), Whitney Museum of American Art, New York (2000), Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles (1999), Serpentine Gallery, London (1994), Musée d’art contemporain, Montreal (1985) and Kunsthalle Basel (1984). Group shows include La Biennale di Venezia (2022), Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, Boston (2021), Hamburger Bahnhof, Berlin (2018), V-A-C Foundation, Palazzo delle Zattere, Venice (2017), Hammer Museum, Los Angeles (2014), Biennale of Sydney (2014), Museum Ludwig, Cologne (2013), Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam (2010), Museum of Modern Art, New York (2010, 2009, 2007), Palazzo Grassi, Venice (2006), Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago (2004), Tate Liverpool (2002), Centre Pompidou, Paris (1988) and Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York (1987).

Education
1966 Art and Design, Parsons School of Design, New York, USA
1965 Syracuse University, Syracuse, USA
Teaching
University of California, Los Angeles, USA
University of California, San Diego, USA
California Institute of Art, Los Angeles, USA
The School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, USA
The University of California, Berkeley, USA
Awards, Grants and Fellowships
2020 Maria Anto & Elsa von Freytag-Loringhove Art Prize
2019 Goslarer Kaiserring ('Emperor's Ring') Prize from the city of Goslar, Germany
2005 The Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement, 51st Venice Biennale
1996 Artist in Residence, Wexner Center for the Arts, Ohio State University, Columbus, OH
1983–84 National Endowment for the Arts Grant, Washington, D.C.
1976–77 Creative Artists Service Program Grant
Public Collections
Akron Art Museum, Akron, OH
Arario Museum, Seoul
Art Institute of Chicago
Bowdoin College Museum of Art, Brunswick, ME
The Broad, Los Angeles
Brooklyn Museum, New York
Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris
Collection Vanmoerkerke, Oostende
Denver Art Museum, Denver, CO
Deste Foundation for Contemporary Art, Athens
DZ BANK Art Collection, Frankfurt
Elgiz Museum, Maslak
Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco
Fonds régional d'art contemporain (FRAC) de Bourgogne, Dijon
George Eastman Museum, Rochester, NY
Glenstone Museum, Potomac, MD
Hammer Museum, Los Angeles
Hallmark Art Collection, Kansas City, MO
Harvard Art Museums, Cambridge, MA
Institute of Contemporary Arts, London
Krannert Art Museum, University of Illinois, Champaign, IL
Los Angeles County Museum of Art
Marciano Art Foundation, Los Angeles
The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York
Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum, Washington University in St. Louis, MO
Milwaukee Art Museum, Milwaukee, WI
Moderna Museet, Stockholm
Mönchehaus Museum, Goslar
Musée d'art moderne et d'art contemporain, Nice
Musée d'art moderne et contemporain de Saint-Étienne Métropole, France
Museum of Contemporary Art Antwerp (MHKA)
Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago
The Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles
Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego
Museum of Contemporary Photography, Columbia College, Chicago
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
Museum Ludwig, Cologne
Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa, Wellington
National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC
Neue Nationalgalerie, Berlin
NSU Art Museum Fort Lauderdale, FL
Philadelphia Museum of Art
Pinault Collection, Paris
Rubell Family Collection, Miami
Saint Louis Art Museum, St. Louis, MO
San Francisco Museum of Modern Art
Seibu Museum of Art, Tokyo
Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington, DC
Solomon R. Guggenheim, New York
Speed Art Museum, Louisville, KY
Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam
Tacoma Art Museum, WA
Tate, London
Vanhaerents Art Collection, Brussels
Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, MN
Whitney Museum of American Art, New York
Yokohama Museum of Art
Zimmerli Art Museum, Rutgers University, New Brunswick, NJ