Gallery 01:7

BLACK AND BLUE

Rashid Johnson situates his work in his own experience of the world, rendering us, the viewer, both witness and accomplice. His film Black and Blue (2021) depicts the life of the protagonist, played by the artist himself, as he goes through his daily routines of eating, driving, exercising, spending time with his family, and sleeping. Rashid Johnson insists on being in all its quotidian complexities, yet at the same time reveals a tension between private and public, between seeing ourselves and being looked at by someone else. Rashid turns the lens to himself and makes us look at the prism of possibilities, within and beyond our own preconceptions.

As artists such as Soufiane Ababri, Snežana Vučetić Bohm, and Melissa Shook (on view in this gallery) demonstrate, a self-portrait is an act of revealing the world through the eyes of one person – filled with desire, love, play, grandeur, violence, and ambiguity.

Cuban-American artist Felix Gonzalez-Torres’s “Untitled” crowns this room with a portrait in the form of words and dates. He joins historical events and more enigmatic personal landmarks, questioning what, ultimately, makes up a person’s biography. The work has continued to change since its first manifestation in 1989. Even after the artist’s death in 1996, new events and dates have been added by the owner or lender each time it is installed to keep the work relevant and dynamic. For the occasion of Seven Rooms and a Garden, Rashid created a new manifestation of “Untitled”, adding words and years relevant to his life.