Barbara Kruger's striking imagery gets right in your face at Lever House (photo by twi-ny/mdr)
Lever House Lobby Gallery
390 Park Ave. at 54th St.
Through November 21
Admission: free
www.leverhouse.com
between being born and dying slideshow
Like Lawrence Weiner, Ed Ruscha, and Jenny Holzer, conceptual artist Barbara
Kruger incorporates words and language into her work, which in the past has
ranged from photography to collages. Born in Newark in 1945 and based in Los
Angeles and New York City, Kruger has been a graphic designer and literature
teacher (she is currently a professor at UCLA), combining the two
disciplines in her latest work, “Between Being Born and Dying,” on view at
Lever House through November 21. Kruger subverts Lever House’s unique glass
structure, covering the inside and the outside — including walls,
ceiling, floor, and beams — with black-and-white words in acrylic ink
on adhesive vinyl reaching seventeen feet high, making such declarative
statements as “If it screams, shove it,” “Plenty should be enough,” and “In
violence we forget who we are” as well as the equation “Belief + Doubt =
Sanity.” Using the striking Helvetica ultra-condensed font and an
in-your-face verticality, Kruger throws social ills at viewers, but somehow
they do not come off as trite cliches. The overall effect is both dizzying
and intoxicating, especially if you stand in the middle of the floor inside
and slowly turn around, feeling as if the words are being shouted at you,
overwhelming your consciousness.