American Flag (Scratch)

1999 - Photography (Photography)

Collier Schorr

year born: 1963
gender: female
nationality: American

Collier Schorr’s prints upend conventions of portrait photography by challenging what it means to “document” a subject. American Flag (Scratch) (1999), for example, depicts an unidentified male subject clad in an American flag-print singlet. With his head and extremities out of frame, the camera focuses on his flush-red torso, his left nipple protruding from the singlet’s strap. A horizontal scratch cuts across his right pectoral muscle, bleeding at its end and nearly dripping on the uppermost stripe of the flag print fabric. The scene’s context is ambiguous, and it is never clear if Schorr’s subject is entering a match or leaving it. By stripping the image of those anterior narratives, Schorr allows the viewer to fully revel in the image’s strange juxtapositions – of bloody injuries and healthy bodies, of patriotic symbols and exposed nipples – without resorting to narrative explication or symbolic interpretation.


Collier Schorr photographs communities of people, from high school wresters in her native New York to teenagers in the German countryside clad in American military uniforms. Her work displays an almost anthropological curiosity, and in documenting her subjects, she tries to find the idiosyncratic details through which people organize into “tribal” relationships with one another. Her images, by extension, blend photographic realism with elements of fiction and fantasy as a means of representing the various ways these tribes identify themselves. Schoor’s work also investigates gender and the ways in which subjects use visual cues and embodied signs to both inhabit and subvert assumed gender expectations.


Colors:



Related works featuring themes of: » United States, » American  
» see more

Horizontal Striation Scrap Lamp and Vertical Striation Scrap Lamp
© » KADIST

Jason Meadows

2009

The Striation Scrap Lamps (vertical and horizontal) although functioning as utilitarian objects also represent Jason Meadows’s interest in a certain kind of crafted sculpture...

Donald of Doom Tank
© » KADIST

Kristen Morgin

2008

Donald of Doom Tank (2008) is a replica of a vintage metal toy with Donald Duck’s image one side and a soldier on the other...

Restaurant, Canton, Ohio
© » KADIST

William E. Jones

2011

In Restaurant, Canton, Ohio (2011), a convenience store offers food, liquor, and Coca Cola to an empty street...

Holly Golightly
© » KADIST

Jason Meadows

2011

Titled afterTruman Capote’s protagonist famously played by Audrey Hepburn in the film Breakfast at Tiffany’s (1961), Holly Golightly (2011) captures the essence of the character: seductive and bold, mysterious and capricious...

Other related works, blended automatically  
» see more

In the Collage II (Marie)
© » KADIST

Collier Schorr

2013

In the Collage II (Marie) (2013), Shorr seems to have an ostensibly clear subject, a female subject identified in the work’s title as “Marie,” a slim but athletic woman with brown hair pictured reclining atop a brilliantly white sheet draped against a marbled tan-and-white backdrop...

Horizontal Striation Scrap Lamp and Vertical Striation Scrap Lamp
© » KADIST

Jason Meadows

2009

The Striation Scrap Lamps (vertical and horizontal) although functioning as utilitarian objects also represent Jason Meadows’s interest in a certain kind of crafted sculpture...

Donald of Doom Tank
© » KADIST

Kristen Morgin

2008

Donald of Doom Tank (2008) is a replica of a vintage metal toy with Donald Duck’s image one side and a soldier on the other...

One Universe, One God, One Nation
© » KADIST

Yin-Ju Chen

One Universe, One God, One Nation was inspired by Hannah Arendt’s analysis of space exploration and by the astrological horoscope of Chinese political and military leader Chiang Kai-shek (1887-1975)...

Related works sharing similar palette  
» see more

Thoughts on Collecting Art - via Forbes
© » LARRY'S LIST

Once a person starts accumulating Art, their mind often turns to forming a Collection...

A public platform awaits you with ‘Red Stage’ by Rashid Johnson
© » CREATIVETIME

A public platform awaits you with 'Red Stage' by Rashid Johnson - Creative Time A public platform awaits you with ‘Red Stage’ by Rashid Johnson May 12th, 2021 Tweet Email Creative Time is pleased to present artist Rashid Johnson’s Red Stage , a participatory steel sculpture that celebrates the vibrancy and creativity found in New York’s public spaces as the city awakens from the COVID-19 pandemic...

Other works by: » Collier Schorr  
» see more

In the Collage II (Marie)
© » KADIST

Collier Schorr

2013

In the Collage II (Marie) (2013), Shorr seems to have an ostensibly clear subject, a female subject identified in the work’s title as “Marie,” a slim but athletic woman with brown hair pictured reclining atop a brilliantly white sheet draped against a marbled tan-and-white backdrop...

Fedex® 10kg Box 2006 FedEx 149801 REV 9/06 MP, Standard Overnight, Los Angeles-San Francisco, trk#800983717740, December 18-19, 2012, International Priority, San Francisco-Beijing, trk# 775046700145, October 27-November 5, 2021
© » KADIST

Walead Beshty

2012

Constructed out of metal or glass to mirror the size of FedEx shipping boxes, and to fit securely inside, Walead Beshty’s FedEx works are then shipped, accruing cracks, chips, scrapes, and bruises along the way to their destination...

South Africa Righteous Space
© » KADIST

Hank Willis Thomas

2014

South Africa Righteous Space by Hank Willis Thomas is concerned with history and identity, with the way race and ‘blackness’ has not only been informed but deliberately shaped and constructed by various forces – first through colonialism and slavery, and more recently through mass media and advertising – and reminds us of the financial and economic stakes that have always been involved in representations of race....

Related works found in the same semantic group  
» see more

Laissez-Faire (Rainbow Flag)
© » KADIST

Alexandre da Cunha

2010

In Laissez-Faire (Rainbow Flag) da Cunha has turned a beach towel into both a painting and a flag...

A Flags-Raising-Lowering Ceremony at my home’s clothes drying rack
© » KADIST

Kwan Sheung Chi

2007

A Flags-Raising-Lowering Ceremony at my home’s cloths drying rack (2007) was realized in the year of the 10th anniversary of the establishment of The Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People’s Republic of China...

West (Flag 1) (Flag 3) (Flag 6)
© » KADIST

Alexandre da Cunha

2011

The series West (Flag 1), West (Flag 3), and West (Flag 6) continues da Cunha’s ongoing exploration of the form’s various vertical, horizontal, and diagonal stripes...

30 Proposals of Flag
© » KADIST

Jao Chia-En

2009

30 Proposals of Flag explores the relationships between signs, meanings, aesthetics, and nations...