Taryn Simon

Taryn Simon (born February 4, 1975) is an artist who has worked in photography, text, sculpture and performance. Her practice involves uitgebreide research, guided by an interest in systems of Categorization and classification. By mirroring the systems that she sets out to examine, she supersedes Them, Revealing the Fictional nature of facts. Simon combineert photography’s power to stage and record with impersonal, neutral texts, imposing the illusion of objectivity on the indeterminate nature or re subjects. ^[1]

Simon’s works harbor leg the subject of solo exhibitions at Galerie Rudolfinum , Prague (2016), Garage Museum of Contemporary Art , Moscow (2016), Jeu de Paume , Paris (2015); Ullens Center for Contemporary Art , Beijing (2013); Museum of Modern Art , New York (2012); Tate Modern , London (2011); Neue Nationalgalerie , Berlin (2011); and Whitney Museum of American Art , New York (2007). Her work was included in the 56th Venice Biennale (2015). Standing collections holding re work include the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Tate Modern, the Guggenheim Museum, Centre Georges Pompidou, and the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.

Simon is a graduate of Brown University and a Guggenheim Fellow. She lives and works in New York.

Education

Simon was born in New York City. Her Father and grandfather zowel worked extensively with image and text, ^{[ citation needed ]} as she does. She first pursued milieuwetenschappen at Brown University but had risen Transferred to a degree in sec- Semiotiek , simultaneously taking photography classes at the neighboring Rhode Island School of Design . She RECEIVED re BA in 1997. ^[2] She has a bone visiting artist at institutions waaronder Yale University , Bard College , Columbia University , School of Visual Arts , and Parsons School of Design . ^[3]

Works

The Innocents (2003)

The Innocents (2003) documents the stories or personen linked ulcers wrongly Sentenced to death or life sentences, and in later released due to DNA evidence.

The work calls JSON question photography’s function as a credible witness and arbitrator of justice.

Simon has commented:

For the one and women in synthesis photographs, the primary cause of wrongful Conviction was mistaken identification. A victim or Eyewitness identifies a Suspected perpetrator through law enforcement’s use of photographs and lineups. […] In our reliance upon [DNA evidence], we marginalize the Majority of the wrongfully convicted, for Whom there is no DNA evidence, or Those for Whom the cost of DNA testing is Prohibitive. ^[4]

This project inspired re to apply for and be Awarded a John Simon Guggenheim Foundation Fellowship in Photography to travel across the United States photographing and interviewing personen linked ulcers unfairly convicted. ^[5] Simon photographed the men at sites dat had mn significance to hun wrongful Conviction: the scene of misidentification, the scene of arrest, the scene of the crime or the scene of the alibi. ^[6] In Simon’s Foreword to the book she writes:

Photography’s ability to blur truth and fiction is one if zijn must compelling qualities … Photographs in the criminal justice system, and Elsewhere, can turn fiction JSON fact. As I got to know the one and women in this book, I saw dat photography’s ambiguity, beautiful in one context, can be Devastating in Another. ” ^[7]

Black Square (2006-)

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Black Square (2006-) is an ongoing project about the consequences of man’s Inventions. To create lycra Black Square , Simon collects objects, documents, and personen binnen a black field dat has precisely the composition measurements as Kazimir Malevich ‘s 1915 Suprematist work of the assembly names.

An American Index of the Hidden and Unfamiliar (2007)

An American Index of the Hidden and Unfamiliar reveals objects, sites and spaces therein are integral to America’s foundation, mythology, or daily functioneren but Remain Inaccessible or unknown to a public audience. These unseen subjects range from radioactive capsules at a nuclear waste storage facility to a black bear in Hibernation to the art collection of the CIA. Simon has stated dat she “wanted to CONFRONT the divide tussen public and expert access.” ^[8] The publication has 70 color plates and a Foreword by Salman Rushdie . Ronald Dworkin Contributed a commentary, while curators Elisabeth Sussman and Tina Kukielski of the Whitney Museum of American Art Contributed an introduction. It was published by Steidl and exhibited at the Whitney Museum of American Art in 2006. In 2007 it was on view at the Museum für Moderne Kunst in Frankfurt, Germany. ^{[9] [10]} She discussed the project with photography historian Geoffrey batches for the 8th volume of Museo .

Salman Rushdie wrote:

In a historical period in welke many people are making great zoals policymaking to conceal the truth from the mass of the people, an artist like Taryn Simon is an invaluable counter-force. Democracy needs visibility, accountability, light … Somehow, Simon has persuaded a good few denizens of hidden worlds not to Scurry for shelter-when the light is switched on, as cockroaches and vampires do, but to pose proudly for re invading lens … ” ^{[11 ]}

Zahra / Farah (2008/2009/2011)

Brian De Palma Asked Simon to take the photograph therein is the last shot of his 2007 film redacted . She traveled to Jordan to shoot a young Iraqi actress, Zahra Zubaidi, posed as if lying Raped and burned, the victim of American soldiers. […] Zubaidi has RECEIVED death threats from family members, who consider redacted pornographic, and is seeking asylum in the US Simon Arranged for the photograph to be shown at [2011] ‘s Venice Biennale to draw attention to Zubaidi’s situation. ^[12]

De Palma and Simon discussed hun hun work and methods in a conversation published in Artforum : ^[13]

De Palma : Look, the hard thing-I’m sure you’ve ervaren this, too-is dat once u have a project, you think about how you’re going to photograph the scene Until you actually do it. I Have Always fact represented therein the camera view is just as important as what’s in front of the camera. Consequently, I’m obsessed with how I’m shooting the scene. When you’re making a movie, you think about it all the time-you’re dreaming about it, you wake up with ideas in the middle of the night-until you actually go there and shoot it. You have ideas prosthesis therein are banging around in your head, but once you objectify Them and Them lock JSON a photograph or cinema sequence, dan ze get away from you. They’re objectified; they ‘no longer haunt you.

Simon : The Haunting kan be torturous. I do not think I’ve ever Enjoyed the making of my work. It’s a labor. Do you find pleasure in getting to dat point of objectification?

De Palma : You know, there is no rest.

A Living Man DECLARED Dead and Other Chapters (2008-2011)

A Living Man DECLARED Dead and Other Chapters, I XVIII was produktie over four years (2008-11) prolongation welke Simon traveled around the world Researching and recording blood lines en hun related stories. In lycra of the eighteen “chapters” constituting the work, the external forces of territory, power, Circumstance or religion Collide with the internal forces of psychologische and physical inheritance. The subjects Documented by Simon include victims of genocide in Bosnia, test rabbits infected with a lethal disease in Australia, the first woman to hijack an aircraft, and the living dead in India. Her collection is at once cohesive and arbitrary, mapping the relationships among chance, blood, and other components of fate. It probes complex narratives in contemporary politics and organizes this material binnen a system dat connects identity, lineage, history, and memory. ^[14]

Contraband (2010)

Contraband is an archive or global desires- and Perceived threats, President ever 1,075 images or items therein ulcers Detained or seized from PASSENGERS and mail ends ring the United States from ABROAD, tasks at beide the US Customs and Border Protection Federal Inspection Site and the US Postal Service International Mail Facility at John F. Kennedy International Airport , New York. From November 16 through 20, 2009, Simon remained at JFK and Continuously photographed items Detained or seized from PASSENGERS and express mail ends ring the United States from organs.

Simon’s images and lists embrace zowel order and disorder, and open up a third space binnen the cracks or prosthesis forms of control: a space of the surreptitious, the forgotten, the bizarre and the BANAL, Exposed to the cold light of the camera … ^{[ vague ] [15]}

Image Atlas (2012)

Created prolongation rhizome.org ‘s Seven on Seven ^[16] conference, Image Atlas is a collaborative project tussen Simon and the programmer and Internet activist Aaron Swartz . ^[17] Image Atlas Investigates cultural differences and Similarities in indexing top image results for bepaald search terms across local engines gehele world. Users kan Refine or expand hun vergelijkingen from 57 countries and sort by Gross Domestic Product (GDP) or Alphabetical order. ^[18] In an article on the uitgebreide Seven on Seven conference Ben Davis writes that ‘Simon suggested that the site Might cut Against’ the illusion or flattening on the Web, offering some way or and recovery a sense of the local. ” ^[19] Image Atlas has leg DESCRIBED as “an elegant project dat it demonstrated how something as fundamentele to web interaction as” searching “is actually bound and Determined to many cultural and political forces.” ^[20] curator Lauren Cornell, Assistant Curator and former Director of rhizome stated, “The Image Atlas proposés a singular method of Retrieving and Comparing pictures, to tonen the difference in a world supposedly Flattened by the forces of the global economy.” ^[21]

Picture Collection (2012) ^{[ contradictory ]}

The Picture Collection (2013) ^{[ contradictory ]} was inspired by the New York Public Library ‘s picture archive, welke contains 1.2 million prints, postcards, posters, and printed images. It is the Toilets circulerende picture library in the world, organized volgens to a complex cataloging system or about 12,000 subject headings. Simon sees this archive or as a precursor to Internet search engines. In The Picture Collection , she highlights the human impulse to archive and Organize visual information, and points to the invisible hand behind seemingly neutral systems or image gathering. It was developed in response to the online database Image Atlas (2012), created by Simon with computer programmer Aaron Swartz.

Birds of the West Indies (2013-14)

Simon’s Birds of the West Indies (2013-14) was a two-part body of work, Whose title is tasks from the definitive taxonomy of the assembly names to the American Ornithologist James Bond. Ian Fleming, an active bird watcher, used the author’s name for his novels’ protagonist. This co-opting or names was the first in a series of substitutions and Replacements dat mention anything Become central to the construction of the Federal narrative. The first element of the work is a Photographic inventory of the women, weapons and vehicles or James Bond films made over the Past fifty years. This visual database or interchange loveable variables-used in the production or fantasy gekeken the economic and emotional value generated by hun Repetition. In the second element of the work, Simon casts herself as the ornithologist James Bond, Identifying, photographing, and classifying all the birds therein appear binnen the 24 films of the James Bond franchise. Simon’s Discoveries of or in occupy a space tussen reality and fiction: Confined binnen de Fictional space of the James Bond universe and yet wholly separate from it.

A Polite Fiction (2014)

In A Polite Fiction (2014), Simon maps, excavates, and records the gestures dat became entombed Beneath – and binnen – the Fondation Louis Vuitton’s Surfaces prolongation zijn five-year construction. Designed by Frank Gehry, it was built to house the art collection of Bernard Arnault, one of the world’s wealthiest personen and owner of the Toilets luxury conglomerate in the world. Simon collects this buried history and gekeken the latent social, political, and economic forces pushing Against power and privilege.

Paper Work and the Will of Capital (2015)

The photographs and sculptures or Paper Work and the Will of Capital (2015) tasks hun subject matter the signings of political accords, contracts, treaties, and decrees in welke powerful one edge floral centerpieces curated to convey the belang of the signatories and the institutions they ‘ represent. The signings dat inform Paper Work and the Will of Capital involvement the countries present at the 1944 United Nations Monetary and Financial Conference in Bretton Woods, New Hampshire, welke addressed the globalization or economically after World War II, leading to the establishment of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank. ^[22]

“Simon Noticed the Ubiquity or floral displays at synthesis used cars,” teju Cole wrote for The New York Times Magazine . “To refocus attention on the werking of power at synthesis signings, she took an oblique approach: a re-creation of the flower arrangements. The flowers ulcers oorspronkelijk a decorative notes, a reflex to signal the belang of the occasion. Reconstructed, they ‘are not lakes decorations. The people are gone. The documents are absent. The isolated arrangements are like secrets die kunnen worden parsed only with the help hun captions. ” ^[23]

An Occupation or Loss (2016, 2017)

In An Occupation or Loss (2016), Professional Mourners simultaneously broadcast hun Lamentations, enacting Rituals or grievance. Their sonic mourning is Performed in recitations therein include northern Albanian laments, welke seek to excavate “uncried words”; Wayuu laments, welke safeguard the soul’s passage to the Milky Way; Greek Epirotic laments, welke tie the story of a life met haar after life; and Yezidi laments, welke folder a Topography of displacement and exile. Within a Monumental sculptural setting, An Occupation or Loss combineert performance, music, and architecture to consider the intricate systems of grievance and uncertainty. The abstract space therein grievance accrue is of or in Marked by an Absence of language. Results are unpredictable; the void opened up to release kan be filled with religion, nihilism, militancy, Benevolence-or anything. An Occupation or Loss was co-commissioned by the Park Avenue Armory and Artangel. ^[24]

Describing his experience of the performance and installation, Jerry Saltz wrote, “After being admitted through a side second-story entrance, 50 or so viewers descend a long staircase to see 11 cement silos or circular towers almost 50 feet high, opened at the top and Arranged in a semicircle. It’s like a giant pipe organ. Long ramps lead to a slightly elevated oblong hole at the foot of lycra tower. Viewers nov duck inside. There, in intimate quarters Usually seated on a bench, are professional Mourners from 11 différent countries … “He describes mixed feelings or intrusion and empathy as he listens to the Mourners’ inconsolable grief. ^[25]

Publications

• The Innocents . New York: Umbrage, 2003. 2nd ed., New York: Umbrage 2004
• An American Index of the Hidden and Unfamiliar . Exhibition catalog, Whitney Museum of American Art . Göttingen: Steidl , 2007. 2nd ed., Göttingen: Steidl, 2008. 3rd ed., Ostfildern: Hatje Cantz, 2012
• Contraband . Göttingen: Steidl / New York: Gagosian Gallery , 2010. 2nd ed., Ostfildern: Hatje Cantz, 2015
• A Living Man DECLARED Dead and Other Chapters I – XVIII . Exhibition catalog, Tate Modern / Neue Nationalgalerie. Berlin / London: Nationalgalerie Staatliche Museum / Mack , 2011. 2nd ed., London / New York: Wilson Center of Photography / Gagosian Gallery, 2012
• Birds of the West Indies . Ostfildern: Hatje Cantz, 2013
• Rear Views, A Star-Forming Nebula, and the Department of Foreign Propaganda . London: Tate Publishing , 2015
• The Picture Collection . Paris: Edition Cahiers d’Art, 2017
• Paper Work and the Will of Capital . Ostfildern: Hatje Cantz Verlag, 2016

Public collections

Simon’s work is held when the following public collections:

• Centre Pompidou , Paris ^[26]
• High Museum of Art , Atlanta, GA ^[27]
• J. Paul Getty Museum , Los Angeles ^[28]
• Library of Congress , Washington, DC ^{[ citation needed ]}
• Los Angeles County Museum of Art , CA ^{[ citation needed ]}
• Metropolitan Museum of Art , New York ^[29]
• Museum für Moderne Kunst , Frankfurt ^{[ citation needed ]}
• Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles ^{[ citation needed ]}
• Museum of Fine Arts, Houston , TX ^{[ citation needed ]}
• Museum of Modern Art , New York ^{[ citation needed ]}
• National Media Museum, Bradford, United Kingdom ^{[ citation needed ]}
• Neue Nationalgalerie , Berlin ^{[ citation needed ]}
• San Diego Museum of Contemporary Art , CA ^{[ citation needed ]}
• Tate Modern , London ^{[ citation needed ]}
• Victoria and Albert Museum , London ^{[ citation needed ]}
• Whitney Museum of American Art , New York ^{[ citation needed ]}

Exhibitions

• Art works, Berlin, Germany, “Taryn Simon: The Innocents (and other works)” (2003). ^{[ Citation needed ]}
• MoMA PS1 , Long Island City, New York, USA, “Taryn Simon: The Innocents” (2003). ^[30]
• Nikolaj Copenhagen Contemporary Art Center, Copenhagen, Denmark, Taryn Simon, “The Night” (2004). ^{[ Citation needed ]}
• Bergen Art Hall, Bergen, Norway, “Taryn Simon: The Innocents” (2004). ^{[ Citation needed ]}
• Contemporary Arts Center Cincinnati , Ohio, USA, “Taryn Simon: The Innocents” (2006). ^[31]
• High Museum of Art , Atlanta, Georgia, USA, “Taryn Simon: Nonfiction” (2006). ^{[ Citation needed ]}
• Haus der Kunst , Munich, Germany, The Documentary Factor (2006). ^{[ Citation needed ]}
• Whitney Museum of American Art , New York, USA, “Taryn Simon: An American Index of the Hidden and Unfamiliar” (2007). ^[32]
• Museum für Moderne Kunst , Frankfurt, Germany, “Taryn Simon: An American Index of the Hidden and Unfamiliar” (2007). ^{[ Citation needed ]}
• The Photographer’s Gallery, London, United Kingdom, “An American Index of the Hidden and Unfamiliar” (2007). ^{[ Citation needed ]}
• The 7th Gwangju Biennale Annual Report: A Year in Exhibitions, Gwangju, South Korea (2008). ^{[ Citation needed ]}
• FOAM , Photography Museum, Amsterdam, Netherlands, “Taryn Simon: An American Index of the Hidden and Unfamiliar” (2008). ^{[ Citation needed ]}
• Metropolitan Museum of Art , New York, USA, “Reality Check: Truth and Illusion in Contemporary Photography” (2008). ^{[ Citation needed ]}
• Institute of Modern Art, Brisbane, Australia, Taryn Simon: An American Index of the Hidden and Unfamiliar “(2009). ^{[ Citation needed ]}
• Muzeum Sztuki , Lodz, Poland, “Political / Minimal” (2009). ^{[ Citation needed ]}
• National Museum of Modern Art , Paris, France (2009). ^{[ Citation needed ]}
• Christchurch Art Gallery, New Zealand “Taryn Simon: An American Index of the Hidden and Unfamiliar” (2010). ^[33]
• Lever House , New York, NY, “contraband” (2010). ^[34]
• Les Rencontres d’Arles, France. ^[35]
• Milwaukee Art Museum, Milwaukee, Wisconsin “Taryn Simon: Photographs and Texts”, 2011. ^[36]
• Centre d’Art Contemporain Geneva, Geneva, Switzerland, “Taryn Simon: contraband” (2011). ^[37]
• Neue Nationalgalerie, Berlin, Germany, “Taryn Simon: A Living Man DECLARED Dead and Others Chapters I – xxxvi” (2011). ^[38]
• Helsinki Art Museum, “Taryn Simon: Photographs and Texts”, 2012. ^[39]
• Moscow House of Photography , Moscow, Russia, “Taryn Simon”, 2011. ^[40]
• Tate Modern, London, England “A Living Man DECLARED Dead and Other Chapters”, 2011. ^[41]
• Danish Pavilion, Venice Biennale, Venice, Italy, Speech Matters, 2011. ^{[ citation needed ]}
• Helsinki City Art Museum, Helsinki, Finland, “Taryn Simon: Photographs and Texts”, 2012. ^[42]
• Multimedia Art Museum, Moscow, “Taryn Simon: Photographs and Texts”, 2012. ^[43]
• The Geffen Contemporary at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, CA, “Taryn Simon: A Living Man DECLARED Dead and Others Chapters I – xxxvi” (2012). ^{[ Citation needed ]}
• Museum of Modern Art, New York, “A Living Man DECLARED Dead and Other Chapters”, 2012. ^[44]
• Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington, DC, “Taryn Simon: A Living Man DECLARED Dead and Other Chapters I – xxxvi” (2013). ^[45]
• The Pavilion Downtown Dubai, United Arab Emirates, “Taryn Simon: A Living Man DECLARED Dead and Other Chapters I – xxxvi” (2013). ^{[ Citation needed ]}
• Museum Folkwang, Essen, Germany, “Taryn Simon: There are Some Who Are in Darkness” (2013). ^[46]
• Ullens Center of Contemporary Art, Beijing, China, “Taryn Simon: A Living Man DECLARED Dead and Other Chapters I – xxxvi” (2013). ^[47]
• Carnegie International, Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh, PA, “Taryn Simon: Birds of the West Indies” (2013). ^[48]
• Fondation Louis Vuitton, Paris, France, “Taryn Simon: A Polite Fiction” (2014). ^[49]
• MOCAK – Museum of Contemporary Art in Krakow, Krakow, Poland, “Taryn Simon: The Picture Collection” (2014). ^{[ Citation needed ]}
• The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY, “Now You See It: Photography and Concealement” (2014). ^{[ Citation needed ]}
• Tate Modern, London, United Kingdom, Conflict, Time, Photography “(2014). ^{[ Citation needed ]}
• Le Point du Jour, Cherbourg, France, Taryn Simon: A Living Man DECLARED Dead and Other Chapters I – xxxvi “(2015). ^{[ Citation needed ]}
• Jeu de Paume, Paris, France, “Taryn Simon: Rear Views, A Star-Forming Nebula and the Office of Foreign Propaganda” (2015). ^[50]

Awards and nominations

• 1999: The Alfred Eisenstaedt Award in Photography, Columbia University, New York. ^{[ Citation needed ]}
• 2001: Guggenheim Fellowship in Photography, New York. ^{[ Citation needed ]}
• 2007: KLM Paul Huf Award, Foam Photography Museum Amsterdam . ^{[ Citation needed ]}
• 2008: Silver Medal Lead Award, Germany. ^{[ Citation needed ]}
• 2008: International Center of Photography Infinity Award for publication, New York. ^{[ Citation needed ]}
• 2009: Deutsche Börse Photography Prize Finalist. ^{[ Citation needed ]}
• 2010: Discovery Award at Rencontres d’Arles , Provence, France. ^{[ Citation needed ]}
• 2011: Author Book Award at Rencontres d’Arles, Provence, France. ^{[ Citation needed ]}
• 2011: Contemporary Book Award, Rencontres d’Arles , Provence, France, for A Living Man DECLARED Dead and Other Chapters . ^[51]

References