Film & Video (Film & Video)

Silhouette in the Graveyard is part of a suite of animated videos by Chitra Ganesh titled The Scorpion Gesture . All five videos incorporate figures and themes from Buddhist mythology and dialogue directly with artworks from the Rubin Museum, for which the videos were originally produced.? The central figure of Silhouette in the Graveyard is Maitreya, the Future Buddha, whose arrival on Earth was prophesied to usher in a new age.

Film & Video (Film & Video)

The title of Rainbow Body by Chitra Ganesh refers to an elevated state of, or metaphor for, the consciousness transformation known as a rainbow body. The Buddhist master Padmasambhava achieved this state from his union with Mandarava, a female spirit (dakini) and princess in Tantric Buddhism. Through study and physical connection, each played a key role in the other’s enlightenment.

Film & Video (Film & Video)

Rabbithole by Chitra Ganesh is a digital animation that refigures a fundamental plot device in myths and fables. Referencing iconic folklore such as Alice in Wonderland, the Odyssey, and the Mahabharata, Ganesh’s video illustrates the story of a hero’s journey and transformation that is not driven by the glory of violent conquest or saving a damsel in distress. Ganesh’s short video features a colorful style of illustration specific to the artist’s comic works.

Photography (Photography)

Susan Sontag, the author of On Photography and Regarding the Pain of Others, was captured through Hujar’s now-iconic photograph in a relaxed yet pensive pose. A friend and supporter of his work as well as his subject, Sontag wrote the introduction for Hujar’s only book published during his lifetime: Portraits in Life and Death.

Drawing & Print (Drawing & Print)

Art of War 1, City in Broad Daylight, Leaving the House, Justice is a Virtue, and Lions are Stronger than Men are linocut prints from the series Sultana’s Dream . This series by artist Chitra Ganesh comprises a large-scale narrative suite inspired by a 1905 feminist utopian (eponymous) text written by a Bengali writer and social reformer, Rokeya Sakhhawat Hossain. Educated thanks to the support of her elite family, Hossain was one of the few Bengali women of her generation writing in English.

Drawing & Print (Drawing & Print)

Glenn Ligon’s diptych, Condition Repor t is comprised of two side-by-side prints. Though simple, each contains a nested stack of historical and self-referential quotations. Both black-and-white prints depict a version of Ligon’s 1988 painting, Untitled (I Am A Man) , which declares the words of the parenthetical in blocky black letters.

Sculpture (Sculpture)

Herculine’s Prophecy by Juliana Huxtable features a kneeling demon-figure on what appears to be a screen-print, placed on a wooden table, which has then been photographed and digitally altered to appear like a book cover, with a title and subtitle across the top, and a poem written across the bottom. This composition is stuck to a metal plate by a series of button magnets, with interjecting phrases on them. The juxtaposition between the mysogynistic, almost puritan poetry that stripes across the bottom and the powerful crouching pose that the femme demon assumes inverts the hegemonic text , instead creating a space of alterity.

Photography (Photography)

Behind the simplicity and beauty of this untitled photograph of a brilliantly-colored flowerbed by Félix González-Torres are two remarkable stories of love, loss, and resilience. As with most of his works, the photograph is untitled followed by a parenthesis that provides some context clues. In this case, an inscription on the reverse of the photograph reads: For Laura (Alice B. Toklas + Gertrude Stein Flower Bed in Paris).