Jordan Wolfson (born 1980) is an American visual artist who lives in Los Angeles. He has worked in video and film, in sculptural installation, and in virtual reality.
Early life and education
Jordan Wolfson was born in 1980 in New York to
parents.
Wolfson grew up in a secular Jewish household. He has 3 older sisters, Jody, Tracy and Jessica Wolfson. He often incorporates his Jewish heritage in his art, utilizing themes of
Jewish identity and cultural symbols, such as the star of David.
He received a BFA in sculpture from the Rhode Island School of Design in Providence in 2003.
Career
Since 2014 his work has included aluminum and
brass sculptures mixed with digital imagery, works using
virtual reality, and
Animatronics sculptures.
Selected works
Female Figure
Wolfson's
Female Figure (2014) is an animatronic sculpture of a woman dressed in a negligée, thigh-high vinyl boots, and a green half-witch mask covered in dirt marks and scuffs.
The figure dances while speaking in Wolfson's voice. Using facial recognition technology, she locks eyes with viewers through a mirror.
In 2019
ARTnews and
Artnet News listed
Female Figure as one of the artworks that defined the decade.
Colored Sculpture
Wolfson's Colored Sculpture (2016) was first shown at
David Zwirner gallery in New York City and later exhibited at the
Tate Modern in London,
LUMA Foundation in Arles, and at the
Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam. The work consists of an animatronic sculptural figure of a boy attached to the ceiling with long chains connected to his head, arm, and leg. The boy's cartoon-like appearance is based on familiar images of Huck Finn, the 1940s television character Howdy Doody, and the MAD magazine character Alfred E. Neuman.
The sculpture's movements - the boy is by turn hoisted up, dropped to the floor, and swung through the air - are timed and regulated by motors built into the ceiling. His eyes are equipped with facial recognition technology that allows the sculpture to make eye contact with viewers present in the room.
Real Violence
Wolfson's immersive 3-D VR work
Real Violence was included in the 2017
Whitney Biennial and immediately became the focus of media attention due to the graphic intensity of the acts it portrays.
was intended to provoke a conversation about the nature of virtual reality as an authentic experience over which the viewer has authority. The work received criticism at the
New Museum screening in 2017. The debate concerned the role of the artist, Wolfson's responsibility in making a political statement with his art, and if there is a role of privilege/power hierarchy that should have been addressed when dealing with the subject matter of violence.
Body Sculpture
Wolfson's
Body Sculpture (2023) is an animatronic work that combines sculpture and performance. The work premiered at the National Gallery of Australia. Wolfson views the work as an expression of “the dark and light sides of the human experience,” from violence and aggression to curiosity and playfulness.
In 2020, the National Gallery of Australia, under the directorship of Nick Mitzevich, purchased it for (£3.5m), about half the museum's annual acquisition budget.[ ]
Recognition
In 2009 Wolfson was awarded the Cartier Award from the Frieze Foundation.
Exhibitions
Following Wolfson's first solo museum exhibition, at the Kunsthalle Zürich in 2004, his work was widely shown at galleries and museums in Europe, Asia, and the United States. His work was first exhibited in Germany in 2011 at the Kunstsammlung Nordrhein-Westfalen. His first solo exhibition in the United Kingdom,
Raspberry Poser, was presented in 2013 at the Chisenhale Gallery in London.
Jordan Wolfson: Ecce Homo/le Poseur, organized by the Stedelijk Museum voor Actuele Kunst (S.M.A.K.) in Ghent in 2013, was the most comprehensive survey of his work to date.
In 2014 a selection of Wolfson's video work was exhibited as part of the 6th Glasgow International, and he participated in 14 Rooms at Art Basel
Other notable exhibitions include:
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2006 – Untitled (Frank Painting Company, Inc.), Whitney Biennial, New York
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2007 – Optical Sound, solo exhibition curated by Alessandro Rabottini, Galleria d'Arte Moderna e Contemporanea di Bergamo (GAMeC), Bergamo, Italy
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2008 – untitled false document, Swiss Institute Contemporary Art New York, New York City
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2009 – The Exhibition Formerly Known as Passengers, CCA Wattis Institute for Contemporary Arts, San Francisco
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2012 – Animation, masks, Alex Zachary Peter Currie gallery, New York City
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2012 – Animation, masks, Kunsthalle Wien, Vienna
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2012–13 – Raspberry Poser, REDCAT, Los Angeles
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2013–14 – Raspberry Poser, solo exhibition, Chisenhale Gallery, London
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2014 – Female Figure, 14 Rooms, Art Basel, Serpentine Gallery, London
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2016 – Colored sculpture, David Zwirner Gallery, New York
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2017 – Real Violence (VR work), Whitney Biennial, New York
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2017 – Riverboat Song, Sadie Coles HQ, London
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2018 – Riverboat Song, David Zwirner Gallery, New York
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2022 – Transformers. Masterpieces of the Frieder Burda Collection in Dialogue with Artificial Beings, Museum Frieder Burda, Baden-Baden
Collections
Wolfson's work is represented in public collections worldwide, including Fondazione Sandretto Re Rebaudengo, Turin; Galleria d’Arte Moderna e Contemporanea di Bergamo, Italy; Magasin III Museum and Foundation for Contemporary Art, Stockholm; Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago;
, Cologne; Stedelijk Museum voor Actuele Kunst (S.M.A.K.), Ghent; the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York,
and the National Gallery of Australia.
Further reading
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"Jordan Wolfson: Ecce Homo/le Poseur," texts by Esther Leslie, Linda Norden, and Philippe Van Cauteren. Interview with the artist by Aram Moshayedi. REDCAT, Los Angeles, Stedelijk Museum voor Actuele Kunst (S.M.A.K.), Ghent, and Verlag der Buchhandlung Walther König, Cologne, 2013.
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Jordan Wolfson, Marion Ackermann (dir.) and Moritz Wesseler. Interview with the artist by Stefan Kalmár. Kunstsammlung Nordrhein-Westfalen, Düsseldorf, and Distanz, Berlin, 2012.
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Cotter, Holland. "Jordan Wolfson." New York Times, April 11, 2014.
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Tumlir, Jan. "Jordan Wolfson." Artforum (March 2013): 285 ill.
External links
