Press Release: Oliver Herring

Oliver Herring artworks–from knit Mylar to videos–at Tang
…Artist invites community to create a work of performance art

Artworks by the internationally recognized artist Oliver Herring will be presented in a new exhibition titled Me Us Them, on view Jan. 31–June 14, 2009, at the Frances Young Tang Teaching Museum and Art Gallery at Skidmore College.

The German-born artist is known for weaving together elements of portraiture, narrative, performance, dance, photography, and video, in unlikely and insightful ways. Based in Brooklyn, New York, Herring has been widely exhibited and critically acclaimed for work that “characteristically opts for some form of tour de force that extracts an extravagant effect from a humble craft-oriented cause” (The New York Times). His work has been shown at the Museum of Modern Art, the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, and the New Museum of Contemporary Art, among others, and Herring himself has been featured on the PBS series Art:21—Art in the Twenty-First Century.

The Tang exhibition will present a 15-year survey of Herring’s work, including the large hand-knitted sculptures made in long hours alone in his studio (representing the Me component of the show’s title); experimental videos and photographic works made with friends and acquaintances (Us), and the improvisational community performance event, Task, that Herring creates with large groups of strangers (Them).

One highlight of the exhibition—and a rare opportunity for the public to join an artwork-in-progress—will be the artist’s newest Task, which is scheduled for all day Sunday, March 22, at Universal Preservation Hall in Saratoga Springs. (The event will be an integral part of the YES Symposium: The Persistence of Optimism hosted by the Tang Museum March 20-22.)

Audience admission to Task is free; applications are required in advance for those interested in taking active part in the event itself. Herring is seeking to gather a diverse group of 35 individuals ranging in background, profession, and age (from 14 years old or older) who are interested in participating in the daylong performance. No prior experience is necessary; all are encouraged to apply. Applications and more information can be obtained by calling or e-mailing Tang curatorial assistant Megan Hyde at 580-5066 or mhyde@skidmore.edu. Applications must be returned to the Tang by Feb. 27 to be considered.

To generate Task, Herring needs only a designated space, a selection of everyday props and materials (cardboard, plastic bags, pencils, tape, markers, ladders, etc.), and the willing participation of strangers who agree to follow a modest procedure: “I write a bunch of simple tasks in order to get the performance going,” the artist explained. “Each is put in a task pool, and the performance starts with each participant taking an envelope, opening it and trying to fulfill that task. Once they’re done, they each write a new task, put it back in the task pool, grab a new task and go on with business. After the first five or 10 minutes, the performance is entirely self-perpetuating.” Herring himself observes and films the action with a video camera in one hand and a digital camera in the other. Self-generating and spontaneous, Herring’s videos and Task performances allow participants, as noted in Art21, “to explore aspects of their personalities through art in a way that would otherwise be unlikely or even impossible.” Videos, photos, and other documentation of past Task events can be seen at Herring’s blog: http://oliverherringtask.wordpress.com/.

Additional public events accompanying Me Us Them include the following:
—Dialogue (4 p.m. Saturday, January 31) featuring Herring in conversation with Skidmore students Francesca Fanelli ’09 and Heather Gilchrist ’09 about his work
—Two curator’s tours of the exhibition (both beginning at noon on Tuesday, February 10, and Wednesday, March 18) conducted by Ian Berry, Malloy Curator of the Tang Museum
—YES Symposium: The Persistence of Optimism (Friday through Sunday, March 20–22), designed to explore optimistic strategies in art and teaching. Symposium highlights include an opening reception (6-7:30 p.m. Saturday, March 21), to celebrate the museum’s spring exhibitions, and Task (10 a.m.–5 p.m. Sunday, March 22), at Universal Preservation Hall in downtown Saratoga Springs.

All public events accompanying Me Us Them are free and open to the public; for more information or a complete schedule for the YES Symposium, call 518-580-8080.

ABOUT THE EXHIBITION
Among Herring’s early studio works on view at the Tang will be examples of the shimmering coats, mattresses, and blankets he laboriously knitted of either clear or silver Mylar, inspired by the memory of Ethyl Eichelberger, a brilliant drag performance artist who committed suicide in 1991.

The exhibition will also present numerous examples of the stop-motion videos and participatory performances Herring began to create in 1998 to balance the long hours of solitary knitting required by his early works, and starring strangers invited in literally off the streets. A series of short, experimental videos called Little Dances of Misfortunes combines gritty physical immediacy with comic appeal and a mesmerizingly dreamy quality that the New York Times called “magical.”

A studio-like section within the Tang exhibition will present a generous selection of finished works, ideas, notes, and sketches demonstrating the wide range of Herring’s interests. Also featured are two large-scale photographs of strangers’ faces covered in colorful food dye, taken after hours of spitting the dye on themselves. (According to one art critic, the photos, “taken in a moment of exhaustion and intensity, double as both portraits and images of near-abstraction.”) Herring’s use of photography is even more labor-intensive and startling in the life-size sculptures titled Gloria, a young woman in a flowered dress, and Wade, a male nude. For each of these works, Herring painstakingly photographed his model from every possible angle, then cut and patchworked details of their clothing and flesh from the thousands of resulting photographs onto carved-Styrofoam shapes.

ABOUT THE ARTIST
Born in Heidelberg, Germany in 1964, Oliver Herring received a BFA from the Ruskin School of Drawing and Fine Art at the University of Oxford in England, and an MFA from Hunter College in New York City.

Herring has received grants from Artspace, the New York Foundation for the Arts, and the Joan Mitchell Foundation. His work has been shown at many and major museums and he has overseen Task performances at venues around the world, including the Seattle Public Library (2008); Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden (2006); Plaza de Toros in Santa Cruz de Tenerife (2003); the Former Federal Security Bank in Lake Worth, Fla. (2003); L’Ecole Supérieur National des Beaux Arts, Paris (2002); and the Masonic Temple at the Great Eastern Hotel, London (2003).

Me Us Them was organized by Tang curator Ian Berry in collaboration with the artist. A catalogue of the exhibition will be available at the Tang Store upon publication. The exhibition and publication are made possible in part with public funds from the New York State Council on the Arts, a state agency; The Overbrook Foundation; and the Friends of the Tang.