Hank Willis Thomas "What Goes Without Saying"

Jack Shainman Gallery

poster for Hank Willis Thomas "What Goes Without Saying"

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Jack Shainman Gallery announces the opening of What Goes Without Saying, Hank Willis Thomas' third solo exhibition with the gallery. The show includes photographs, sculpture, painting and new media, all which delve into the construction of mythologies embedded in popular culture. Known for his innovative use of advertising, a globally ubiquitous language, he builds complex narratives about history, identity and race. This show brings together several facets of Thomas' practice to explore objects and language, torn from their history, brought to our present, and repurposed to reveal the process of their agency.

The works in What Goes Without Saying draw from a section of Roland Barthes' book, Mythologies, to explore the ideas of explicit and implicit representations found in objects, gestures and phrases. By separating language from the advertising in which it appears, he effectively deconstructs the relationship between the reader and viewer. In Thomas' new carborundum works, part of the Fair Warning series, he takes text from cigarette advertising in magazines from the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s, retaining the font while abandoning the accompanying visuals. The decontextualized slogans like Stronger Yet Milder, Measurably Long, and Immeasurably Cool, come to stand for more than just a cigarette, highlighting the adjectives used to connote power and elegance, often times with a sexual tone. These works, produced at the Lower East Side Print Shop where Thomas is currently in residence, are made from a material that simultaneously provi des a galactic backdrop while mimicking the non-slip adhesive commonly used to demarcate space in museums. The use of the material further complicates the object-viewer relationship.

Representing identity through symbol and political motive, Thomas brings together a series of paintings sourced from the advocacy buttons worn in support of parties, movements and ideologies over the past fifty years. These small gestures are used as intellectual weapons and markers of participation. Alliances are transformed into precious objects that speak to the creation of collective language and the power of symbols.

Individual objects and their histories are further explored in Thenceforward and forever free, an enlarged replica of a mid-19th century abolitionist lapel pin toting a photograph encircled by delicately wrought alloy metal known to be one of the very first political buttons to incorporate a photograph. Thomas is able to resurrect the object's history and re-charge its agency to reflect a characteristically American means of both political advertising and personal expression.

What Goes Without Saying focuses on subtext, shifting meaning and the complexity of historical actions embedded in visual culture. These ideas are important in the context of the current election and the theater of the campaigns.

Media

Schedule

from October 18, 2012 to November 17, 2012

Opening Reception on 2012-10-18 from 18:00 to 20:00

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