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Roni Horn aka Roni Horn

Nov 6, 2009–Jan 24, 2010

For more than thirty years, Roni Horn (b. 1955) has been developing work of concentrated visual power and intellectual rigor, often exploring issues of gender, identity, androgyny, and the complex relationship between object and subject. Because the artist chooses not to privilege any one medium, Horn’s art defies easy categorization. Materials--often used with remarkable virtuosity and sensitivity--take on metaphorical qualities and relate key themes with great visual power. Horn’s interest in doubling and identity, for example, is central to understanding her approach to the genres of portraiture and landscape. Image-specific photographic portraits and ethereally beautiful abstract cast glass sculpture relay aspects of both. Similarly, Horn’s intricately cut and pigmented drawings suggest something of the elemental nature of the earth that relates in turn to how the landscape of Iceland, where Horn has traveled and made work since 1975, has informed her practice.

Throughout the exhibition’s installation at the Whitney, the integration and cross relationships among the mediums in which the artist works will be fluid, and the presentation on two floors will explore structurally the crucial concept of doubling in Horn’s work. Included in the exhibition are approximately seventy works, varying in scale from small drawings to room-sized photographic installations to sculptures weighing several tons. The exhibition will be accompanied by a fully illustrated two-volume publication: a catalogue with an introduction by the three curators, and an essay by Briony Fer, and a subject index, a second volume in the form of a glossary that is devoted to important ideas in Horn's practice or that relate to individual works.

Jointly organized by the Whitney Museum of American Art and Tate Modern, Roni Horn aka Roni Horn is the most comprehensive overview of Roni Horn’s work to date. The curators, who are working in close collaboration with Horn, are the Whitney’s chief curator and associate director for programs Donna De Salvo and curator of drawings Carter E. Foster, and Mark Godfrey, curator at Tate Modern. Following the Whitney’s presentation, it travels to The Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston, where it will be on view February 19–June 13, 2010.

Major support for this exhibition is provided by The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts.

Generous support is provided by the Lannan Foundation, The James R. Hedges, IV Family Foundation, the Robert Mapplethorpe Foundation, and Donald R. Mullen, Jr.

Additional support is provided by Louise Bourgeois, Agnes Gund, Jennifer Stockman, Nina and Michael Zilkha, The Fifth Floor Foundation, and Elizabeth A. Sackler—JCF, Museum Educational Trust.





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Exhibition Catalogue

This catalogue has been produced to accompany the most comprehensive overview of Horns work to date. Horn has developed the structure of this two-volume publication. The catalogue volume includes an insightful essay by Briony Fer as well as a plate section of works in the exhibition. The other volume, the subject index, is fully illustrated and includes texts on a variety of topics related to Horns work by a variety of prominent artists, critics, curators, and cultural figures. In addition, the subject index also includes Horns own writing, which is illuminating and engaging for those with a longstanding interest in her work, as well as for people encountering it for the first time.

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Explore works from this exhibition
in the Whitney's collection

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In the News

Review: “as direct and fresh a meditation on our surroundings as anything out there today.”
Time Out New York

Review: “one of the most fascinating shows around”
The Washington Post

“Who is Roni Horn? For years, the artist has been asking that very question herself”
W Magazine


“an expansive and eloquent presentation of the artist’s corpus of drawing, sculpture, photography, and books.”
Artforum

“20 Must-See Fall Art Events”
The L Magazine