Sherrie Levine

Throughout her forty-year career, Sherrie Levine (American, born 1947) has investigated the question of originality in art. Part of the so-called “Pictures Generation,” which took its name from the groundbreaking 1977 exhibition at New York City’s Artists Space, Levine challenged the public’s understanding of authorship and ownership. She continues to encourage a fresh awareness of Modernism and its icons through her post-minimalist conceptual art practice.

The works in this exhibition include two recently donated examples of Levine’s earlier appropriations and three works from 2011/12. The bronze sculpture Untitled (Hat) recreates the signature fedora of Joseph Beuys, the influential German post-World War II artist and teacher, through luxurious material to critique the marketplace that fetishizes and monetizes artists. Also on view are two works in serial formats, including Monochromes after Monet: 1 -16, a magisterial suite of paintings that incorporates present-day technology. Beginning with a reproduction of a famous waterlilies painting by Claude Monet, Levine used a digital scanning program to determine the average occurrence and density of colors across the surface. The 16 panels identify the dominant color of sections of the original painting when viewed from left to right. Levine’s work focuses the viewer on the relationships between the object, its reproduction, and our knowledge or experience of it to create an entirely new artwork

Curated by Bruce Guenther, Chief Curator and The Robert and Mercedes Eichholz Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art. Sponsored in part by the Miller Meigs Endowment for the Contemporary Arts and the Paul G. Allen Family Foundation.