4
Sep
2020
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photo: Amanda Demme

why write: jenny holzer — be of use, understandable content

Why Write? Jenny Holzer:

jenny holzer (tate.org)
(image: tate)

‘I wanted to see if I could make anything that would be of use to or have some kind of meaning for a general audience, people on their way to lunch who didn’t care anything about art.’

source: Goodman gallery bio


“With the Truisms, and subsequently the Inflammatory Essays and some other series, I had to assume a number of very different identities to be able to write them properly – especially since I am not really a writer. I have to use every tool available to me to make the text convincing”

“The purpose of writing so many distinct points of view was to question, ‘What do you do when these things are all around and there are individuals fervently saying each?’”

source: https://www.anothermag.com/art-photography/11126/jenny-holzer-on-the-power-of-the-word-in-art


I used language because I wanted to offer content that people—not necessarily art people—could understand. Jenny Holzer

source: https://www.interviewmagazine.com/art/jenny-holzer

photo: Amanda Demme

https://www.thecut.com/2018/10/women-and-power-jenny-holzer.html


KK thoughts.

  1. example of a) expressive writing, b) perspective-shifting/psychological distancing (see Pennebaker, James).
  2. trope (see Goddard, Linda) of I am not a writer
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