Vanessa Beecroft
Encyclopedia
Vanessa Beecroft is an Italian contemporary artist
living in Los Angeles.
, usually involving live female models (often nude). At her performances, video recordings and photographs are made, to be exhibited as documentation of the performances, but also as separate works of art. The work and her conceptual approach is neither performance nor documentary, but something in between, and closer to Renaissance painting. She sets up a structure for the participants in her live events to create their own ephemeral composition. The performances are existential encounters between models and audience, their shame and their expectations. Each performance is made for a specific location and often references the political, historical, or social associations of the place where it is held. Beecroft’s work is deceptively simple in its execution, provoking questions around identity politics and voyeurism in the complex relationship between viewer, model and context.
Vanessa Beecroft's performances have been described as art, fashion, brilliant, terrible, evocative, provocative, disturbing, sexist, and empowering. The primary material in her work is the live female figure, which remains ephemeral, and separate. These women, mainly unclothed, similar, unified through details like hair color, or identical shoes, stand motionless, unapproachable and regimented in the space while viewers watch them. Neither performance nor documentary, Beecroft's live events are recorded through photography and film, but her conceptual approach is actually closer to painting: she makes contemporary versions of the complex figurative compositions that have challenged painters from the Renaissance onwards. Beecroft's more recent work has a slightly more theatrical approach—the uniforms are period clothing, not nudity, and some of her performances include food, while others have featured men in military attire.
, 1993, in which she presented a series of drawings along with the past eight years of her Food Diary. The following year she exhibited in New York for the first time, at the Andrea Rosen Gallery in New York. Later in 1994, VB08 took place at P.S.1 in Long Island City, NY.
More recently, in VB39, 1999 and in VB42, 2000 the artist explored the possibilities of fully male performances with the U.S. Navy in San Diego, CA and with the U.S. Silent Service at the Intrepid in New York, respectively.
Beecroft's performances have taken place at many notable art institutions: VB28 at the Venice Biennale
in 1997; VB35 at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum
, New York in 1998; VB40 at the MCA, Sydney, Australia in 1999; VB43 at the Gagosian Gallery
in London in 2000; VB45 at the Vienna Kunsthalle in 2001; VB50 at the São Paulo Bienal, Brazil in 2002; VB52, part of a retrospective show, at the Castello di Rivoli in 2003; VB54 at an exhibit called Terminal 5
at the TWA Flight Center
of JFK Airport in 2004, an exhibition that closed abruptly after the building itself was vandalized during an opening party.
VB55, a recent example, featured one hundred women standing still in Berlin's Neue Nationalgalerie
for three hours, each woman oiled from the waist up and wearing nothing but a pair of pantyhose. It was staged in April 2005.
In October 2005, Beecroft staged a performance on the occasion of the opening of the Louis Vuitton
store on the Champs-Elysees
in Paris. For the same event, Beecroft placed models on the shelves next to Louis Vuitton bags.
VB61, took place in the Pescheria del Rialto
in Venice
on 8 June 2007. It involved "approximately 30 Sudanese women lying face-down on a white canvas on the ground, simulating dead bodies piled on top of one another" and represented the genocide in Darfur
, Sudan
.
Beecroft’s attempt to adopt Sudanese twins was the topic of the documentary The Art Star and the Sudanese Twins, which was included in the Sundance Film Festival’s World Cinema Documentary Competition.
One of her recent performances, VB65, took place at PAC
in Milan in March 2009, and featured a "Last Supper
" of African immigrants, legal and illegal, dressed in suits, eating chicken without cutlery.
From her marriage to sociologist Greg Durkin she has two sons.
2010
2009
2008
2007
2006
2005
2004
2003
2002
2001
2000
1999
1998
1997
1996
1995
1994
1993
Contemporary art
Contemporary art can be defined variously as art produced at this present point in time or art produced since World War II. The definition of the word contemporary would support the first view, but museums of contemporary art commonly define their collections as consisting of art produced...
living in Los Angeles.
Artistic practice
Beecroft's work is a fusion of conceptual issues and aesthetic concerns, focusing on large-scale performance artPerformance art
In art, performance art is a performance presented to an audience, traditionally interdisciplinary. Performance may be either scripted or unscripted, random or carefully orchestrated; spontaneous or otherwise carefully planned with or without audience participation. The performance can be live or...
, usually involving live female models (often nude). At her performances, video recordings and photographs are made, to be exhibited as documentation of the performances, but also as separate works of art. The work and her conceptual approach is neither performance nor documentary, but something in between, and closer to Renaissance painting. She sets up a structure for the participants in her live events to create their own ephemeral composition. The performances are existential encounters between models and audience, their shame and their expectations. Each performance is made for a specific location and often references the political, historical, or social associations of the place where it is held. Beecroft’s work is deceptively simple in its execution, provoking questions around identity politics and voyeurism in the complex relationship between viewer, model and context.
Vanessa Beecroft's performances have been described as art, fashion, brilliant, terrible, evocative, provocative, disturbing, sexist, and empowering. The primary material in her work is the live female figure, which remains ephemeral, and separate. These women, mainly unclothed, similar, unified through details like hair color, or identical shoes, stand motionless, unapproachable and regimented in the space while viewers watch them. Neither performance nor documentary, Beecroft's live events are recorded through photography and film, but her conceptual approach is actually closer to painting: she makes contemporary versions of the complex figurative compositions that have challenged painters from the Renaissance onwards. Beecroft's more recent work has a slightly more theatrical approach—the uniforms are period clothing, not nudity, and some of her performances include food, while others have featured men in military attire.
Performances
Beecroft’s first exhibition was VB01, in MilanMilan
Milan is the second-largest city in Italy and the capital city of the region of Lombardy and of the province of Milan. The city proper has a population of about 1.3 million, while its urban area, roughly coinciding with its administrative province and the bordering Province of Monza and Brianza ,...
, 1993, in which she presented a series of drawings along with the past eight years of her Food Diary. The following year she exhibited in New York for the first time, at the Andrea Rosen Gallery in New York. Later in 1994, VB08 took place at P.S.1 in Long Island City, NY.
More recently, in VB39, 1999 and in VB42, 2000 the artist explored the possibilities of fully male performances with the U.S. Navy in San Diego, CA and with the U.S. Silent Service at the Intrepid in New York, respectively.
Beecroft's performances have taken place at many notable art institutions: VB28 at the Venice Biennale
Venice Biennale
The Venice Biennale is a major contemporary art exhibition that takes place once every two years in Venice, Italy. The Venice Film Festival is part of it. So too is the Venice Biennale of Architecture, which is held in even years...
in 1997; VB35 at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum
Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum
The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum is a well-known museum located on the Upper East Side of Manhattan in New York City, United States. It is the permanent home to a renowned collection of Impressionist, Post-Impressionist, early Modern, and contemporary art and also features special exhibitions...
, New York in 1998; VB40 at the MCA, Sydney, Australia in 1999; VB43 at the Gagosian Gallery
Gagosian Gallery
Gagosian Gallery is a contemporary art gallery owned and directed by Larry Gagosian. There are currently eleven gallery spaces: three in New York; two in London; one in each of Beverly Hills, Rome, Athens, Paris, Geneva, Hong Kong and Moscow.-1980s:...
in London in 2000; VB45 at the Vienna Kunsthalle in 2001; VB50 at the São Paulo Bienal, Brazil in 2002; VB52, part of a retrospective show, at the Castello di Rivoli in 2003; VB54 at an exhibit called Terminal 5
Terminal 5 (exhibition)
Terminal 5 was an art exhibition that took place in October 2004 at the then disused Eero Saarinen–designed TWA Flight Center at New York's JFK Airport....
at the TWA Flight Center
TWA Flight Center
The TWA Flight Center or Trans World Flight Center, opened in 1962 as a standalone terminal at New York's John F. Kennedy International Airport .for Trans World Airlines...
of JFK Airport in 2004, an exhibition that closed abruptly after the building itself was vandalized during an opening party.
VB55, a recent example, featured one hundred women standing still in Berlin's Neue Nationalgalerie
Neue Nationalgalerie
Neue Nationalgalerie at the Kulturforum is a museum for modern art in Berlin, with its main focus on the early 20th century. It is part of the Nationalgalerie of the Staatliche Museen zu Berlin...
for three hours, each woman oiled from the waist up and wearing nothing but a pair of pantyhose. It was staged in April 2005.
In October 2005, Beecroft staged a performance on the occasion of the opening of the Louis Vuitton
Louis Vuitton
Louis Vuitton Malletier – commonly referred to as Louis Vuitton , or shortened to LV – is a French fashion house founded in 1854 by Louis Vuitton. The label is well known for its LV monogram, which is featured on most products, ranging from luxury trunks and leather goods to ready-to-wear, shoes,...
store on the Champs-Elysees
Champs-Élysées
The Avenue des Champs-Élysées is a prestigious avenue in Paris, France. With its cinemas, cafés, luxury specialty shops and clipped horse-chestnut trees, the Avenue des Champs-Élysées is one of the most famous streets and one of the most expensive strip of real estate in the world. The name is...
in Paris. For the same event, Beecroft placed models on the shelves next to Louis Vuitton bags.
VB61, took place in the Pescheria del Rialto
Rialto
The Rialto is and has been for many centuries the financial and commercial centre of Venice. It is an area of the San Polo sestiere of Venice, Italy, also known for its markets and for the Rialto Bridge across the Grand Canal....
in Venice
Venice
Venice is a city in northern Italy which is renowned for the beauty of its setting, its architecture and its artworks. It is the capital of the Veneto region...
on 8 June 2007. It involved "approximately 30 Sudanese women lying face-down on a white canvas on the ground, simulating dead bodies piled on top of one another" and represented the genocide in Darfur
Darfur
Darfur is a region in western Sudan. An independent sultanate for several hundred years, it was incorporated into Sudan by Anglo-Egyptian forces in 1916. The region is divided into three federal states: West Darfur, South Darfur, and North Darfur...
, Sudan
Sudan
Sudan , officially the Republic of the Sudan , is a country in North Africa, sometimes considered part of the Middle East politically. It is bordered by Egypt to the north, the Red Sea to the northeast, Eritrea and Ethiopia to the east, South Sudan to the south, the Central African Republic to the...
.
Beecroft’s attempt to adopt Sudanese twins was the topic of the documentary The Art Star and the Sudanese Twins, which was included in the Sundance Film Festival’s World Cinema Documentary Competition.
One of her recent performances, VB65, took place at PAC
Padiglione d'Arte Contemporanea
Padiglione d'arte contemporanea is a contemporary art museum in Milan, Italy. It is located in via Palestro, near Giardini Pubblici Indro Montanelli.- References :* - External links :*...
in Milan in March 2009, and featured a "Last Supper
Last Supper
The Last Supper is the final meal that, according to Christian belief, Jesus shared with his Twelve Apostles in Jerusalem before his crucifixion. The Last Supper provides the scriptural basis for the Eucharist, also known as "communion" or "the Lord's Supper".The First Epistle to the Corinthians is...
" of African immigrants, legal and illegal, dressed in suits, eating chicken without cutlery.
Personal
- Born 1969: Genoa, Italy
- 1983 - 1987: Civico Liceo Artistico Nicol Barabino Architettura, Genoa
- 1987 - 1988: Accademia Ligustica Di Belle Arti Pittura, Genoa
- 1988 - 1993: Accademia di Belle Arti, Brera (Stage Design), Milan, Italy
From her marriage to sociologist Greg Durkin she has two sons.
Exhibitions
Selected Exhibitions2010
- VB68 Museum für Moderne Kunst, Frankfurt a. M., Germany
- VB66 Mercato Ittico, Naples, Italy
2009
- VB65 PAC, Milan, Italy
- VB64 Deitch Studies, Long Island City, New York, U.S.A.
2008
- VB63 VBKW, Ace Gallery, Los Angeles
- VB62 Lo Spasimo, Palermo, Sicily, Italy
2007
- VB61 Still Death! Darfur Still Deaf? Pescheria Di Rialto, Venice, Italy
- VB60 Shinsegae, Seoul, Korea
2006
- VBLV 11th Art Forum, Berlin, Germany
- VB59 National Gallery, London, UK
- Alphabet Concept, Espace Louis Vuitton, Paris, France
2005
- VB58 Push Button House, Collins Park, Art Basel, Miami, U.S.A.
- VB56 Louis Vuitton Champs-Élysées, Paris, France
- VB55 Neue Nationalgalerie, Berlin, Germany
2004
- VB54 Terminal 5Terminal 5 (exhibition)Terminal 5 was an art exhibition that took place in October 2004 at the then disused Eero Saarinen–designed TWA Flight Center at New York's JFK Airport....
at the TWA Flight CenterTWA Flight CenterThe TWA Flight Center or Trans World Flight Center, opened in 1962 as a standalone terminal at New York's John F. Kennedy International Airport .for Trans World Airlines...
, JFK airport, New York, U.S.A. - VB53 Tepidarium, Giardino dell'Orticultura, Florence, Italy
2003
- VB52 and Retrospective, Castello di Rivoli Museo di Arte Contemporanea, Turin, Italy
2002
- VB51 Schloss Vinsebeck, Steinheim, Germany
- VB50 São Paulo Biennial, São Paulo, Brazil
2001
- VB48 Palazzo Ducale, Genoa, Italy
- VB47 Peggy Guggenheim Museum, Venice, Italy
- VB46 Gagosian GalleryGagosian GalleryGagosian Gallery is a contemporary art gallery owned and directed by Larry Gagosian. There are currently eleven gallery spaces: three in New York; two in London; one in each of Beverly Hills, Rome, Athens, Paris, Geneva, Hong Kong and Moscow.-1980s:...
, Los Angeles, U.S.A. - VB45 Kunsthalle Wien, Vienna, Austria
2000
- VB43 Gagosian GalleryGagosian GalleryGagosian Gallery is a contemporary art gallery owned and directed by Larry Gagosian. There are currently eleven gallery spaces: three in New York; two in London; one in each of Beverly Hills, Rome, Athens, Paris, Geneva, Hong Kong and Moscow.-1980s:...
, London, UK - VB42 Intrepid: The Silent Service, The Intrepid Sea - Air - Space Museum, Whitney Biennial, New York, U.S.A.
1999
- VB40 Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney, Australia
- VB39 “US. NAVY SEALs“, Museum of Contemporary Art, San Diego, CA
- VB38 Galerie Analix, Geneva, Switzerland
- VB37 Wacoal Art Center, Tokyo, Japan
1998
- VB36 Galerie Fur Zeitgenossische Kunst, Leipzig, Germany
- VB35 “Show“, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, NY
- VB34 Moderna Museet, Stockholm, Sweden
1997
- VB33 Institute of Contemporary Art (ICA), London
- VB32 Germany, Städtisches Museum Abteiberg, Mönchengladbach
- VB31 Institute of Contemporary Art (ICA), Boston, MA
- VB30 II Biennial, Santa Fe, NM
- VB29 FRAC, Le Nouveau Musée, Lyon, France
- VB28 XLVII Esposizione Internazionale d'Arte, Venice BiennaleVenice BiennaleThe Venice Biennale is a major contemporary art exhibition that takes place once every two years in Venice, Italy. The Venice Film Festival is part of it. So too is the Venice Biennale of Architecture, which is held in even years...
, Venice, Italy - VB27 Galerie Analix, Geneva, Switzerland
- VB26 Galleria Lia Rumma, Naples, Italy
1996
- VB25 Stedelijk Van Abbemuseum, Eindhoven, Netherlands
- VB24 Galerie Ghislaine Hussenot, Paris, France
- VB23 Ludwig Museum, Cologne, Germany
- VB22 Miu Miu Store, New York, NY
- VB21 Galleria Massimo De Carlo, Milan, Italy
- VB20 Institute of Contemporary Art, (ICA), Philadelphia, PA
- VB19 The Renaissance Society, the University of Chicago, Chicago, IL
- VB18 CAPC, Musee d'Art Contemporain, Bordeaux, France
- VB17 The Dakis Joannou Collection, The Factory, Athens, Greece
- VB16 Deitch Projects, New York
1995
- VB15 Foundation Cartier pour L’Art Contemporain,Paris, France
- VB14 Comune di Castelvetro di Modena, Italy
- VB13 “Play / Replica“, Basel Art Fair, Basel, Switzerland
- VB12 Associazione Culturale Arte Nova, Pescara, Italy
- VB11 Galerie Analix, Geneva, Switzerland
1994
- VB10 Palazzina Liberty, Milan, Italy
- VB09 “Ein Blonder Traum“, Galerie Schipper & Krome, Cologne, Germany
- VB08 “Lotte im Kampf mit den Bergen“, P.S.1 Contemporary Art Center, Long Island City, NY
- VB07 “Lotte“, Andrea Rosen Gallery, New York, NY
- VB06 “R. Und Auch P.“, Castello di Rivoli, Museo d'Arte Contemporanea, Rivoli, Italy
- VB05 Serre di Rapolano, Rapolano Terme, Italy,
- VB04 “Nicht Versoehnt“, Trevi Flash Art Museum, Trevi, Italy
- VB03 “Maedchen in Uniform“, Galleria Massimo De Carlo, Milan, Italy
- VB02 “Jane bleibt Jane", Courtesy Fac-Simile, Milan, Italy
1993
- VB01 “Film“, Galleria Inga-Pin,Milan, Italy
External links
- Artist's website
- Vanessa Beecroft at Cosmic Galerie
- http://www.deitch.com/artists/sub.php?artistId=20Vanessa Beecroft at Deitch ProjectsDeitch ProjectsDeitch Projects was a contemporary art gallery in New York City founded by Jeffrey Deitch.-History:Since opening with a performance by Vanessa Beecroft in February 1996, the gallery has presented nearly one hundred and eighteen solo exhibitions and projects, ten thematic exhibitions, and a few...
] - Vanessa Beecroft at designboom.com
- Vanessa Beecroft- Classic Cruelty
- http://www.guardian.co.uk/elsewhere/journalist/story/0,7792,1455336,00.htmlReview of VB55 by The GuardianThe GuardianThe Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...
] - Las pinturas vivas de Vanessa Beecroft