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ELLEN GALLAGHER Double Natural (detail), 2002 Plasticine, ink and paper on canvas 96 x 192 inches (243.8 x 487.7 cm |
"Ellen Gallagher has developed a language of tiny pictographs set on large fields of paper and canvas. Often built up in shallow relief, her symbols look from a distance to be abstract forms; their combination of repetition and variation is sometimes associated with the rigorously non-objective paintings of Agnes Martin. Only on closer examination are these forms revealed to be eyes, mouths, faces, hairstyles, and the like–that is, physical attributes that are singled out for special significance in racist physiognomies. Even as Gallagher mimes the typological process, however, she breaks down its constituent parts, its loaded details, nearly to the point of their utter destruction. " Hal Foster, "Legibilities of race" in Art since 1900, Thames & Hudson, p. 642.
In his discussion of politicized black art of the early 1990s Hal Foster places Ellen Gallagher's practice along side that of Glenn Ligon.
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| Glenn Ligon Figure #59 (2010) Zabludovic Collection, London |
