Weekly Inspiration No. 3

This week I looked at my usual go to for artists, artcyclopedia.com, and ended up on the instillation artist page.  There was a decently long list of artists to choose from dating back to an artist born in 1917.  I started by going past names that I knew like Rebecca Horn and Annette Messager.  I looked a few artists I thought I recognized and wasn't really impressed by the work that I saw.  Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that these artists aren't good at what they do.  I just wasn't really "inspired" I guess is what I'm trying to say.  I then decided I would look at all the American artists on this list.  I kept going until I found Zoe Leonard.  She was born in New York and still works and lives in the state.  I'm not going to go into as much detail probably as the other two artists I've researched so far.  I didn't really delve into her work until today.  I'm not going to lie, I definitely put this week's blog off until last minute.  Nothing seemed to grab me, but she's the one that kept me interested enough to look at more of her work so here we are.

"1961", 2002-ongoing

This was the installation that initially caught my attention and made me want to see more of her work.  This piece, Leonard adds a vintage suit case for every year she's alive.  It's interesting to me that she used suit cases to represent a year of her life.  I wonder what the significance is.  Did she travel a lot in her childhood?  Were her parents in the military and that's why she traveled so much.  Does she just like vintage suit cases?  Why mostly blue vintage cases?

I then found an interview with Leonard.  Here she explained her process.  As an artist, as you will see in the next pictures I post, who works with photography a lot she wants her viewers to see things how she sees them.  They'll obviously make their own interpretation of her work, but that's part of the process.  The next installation I saw is called "Strange Fruit (For David)."  This also caught my attention because in the text surrounding this piece Billie Holiday came up.  She had a song with the same name.  This piece was done around a time when Leonard was big in the AIDS awareness movement.  She sewed zippers and used yarn and string and buttons to dried fruit skins.  From what I gathered it was for a friend who died of AIDS.

"Strange Fruit (for David)," 1992-1997

"Strange Fruit (for David)" detail, 1992-1997

There is another installation she did that interested me as well.   This installation is of dolls that Leonard found at yard sales and thrift stores over a period of time.  It seems from the things I've read that she found it interesting that all of them were just discarded.  And that she thought of the dolls' story: where they came from, who played with them, and why they were given away or discarded.  

"Mouth Open, Teeth Showing," 2000.

Another thing she talked about in the interview I read was that she took pictures at this medical museum in Paris.  There was a bearded lady in a Ball jar.  It doesn't seem to be a Ball jar in the photograph she took, but that's what she said a few times in the interview.  Leonard said that this "specimen" was just in a back room on top of a filing cabinet or something.  Just an afterthought it seemed.  It fascinated her that this poor woman's head was just discarded like that.  And so many questions: were her family compensated, was her body buried, where did she come from?  I guess she worked for a circus, but still, it's so creepy that they preserved her head for science? 

"Preserved Head of a Bearded Woman, Musee Orfilia," 1991.

One of the photo installations I really enjoy in its entirety is "Analogue."  This is a compilation of 412 photographs she took with a Rolleiflex camera.  She took pictures from 1998-2009 of neighborhoods in New York City.  There are a lot of store fronts and street cart vendors.  It's neat to see the changes in the storefronts over the years.  

"Analogue," 1998-2009.

This is what the installation looks like in a museum.

"Analogue," 1998-2009.

I hope you enjoyed looking at some of the work by Zoe Leonard.  I'll leave you with one of her more recent installations.  I definitely relate to this artist.  Through my artwork, especially my photography, I want the viewer to see things the way I do.  They might not view it in the same way that I do, but that's the interesting part about hearing what people think of your artwork.  They see things, sometimes, in a completely different way than I do.  Leonard's view of the world changes in medium as well which I relate to as well.  She might feel that a physical found object is the way to show how she's feeling about a subject, or maybe it's a photograph, or a group of photographs.  And the subject matter is all over the place too.  Which is interesting to me.  She has different feelings at different points in her life and she's sharing that with the world.  We get to see into her diary so to speak.  She's putting herself out there for the world to see.  That's brave, to me.  To put all your thoughts and emotions out in the open, very courageous.