Recollection: Lorna Simpson highlights the Walker’s longstanding commitment to this important Brooklyn-based conceptual artist. It features six major works from the collection that spans a wide variety of media, including pieces from the early 1990s on paper and felt, a film commissioned as part of Simpson’s 1998-99 artist residency at the Walker, and a new acquisition being exhibited for the first time.
Imbuing her work with the analytical rigor of a sociologist and the lyrical sensibility of a poet, Simpson has since the mid-1980s broadened the horizons of contemporary photography with a body of work that persistently interrogates notions of racial and sexual identity, the body, interpersonal communication, and relationships. She has found inspiration in the histories of both photography and cinema, invoking in her work the feel of historical images and film noir, and more recently embracing found, vintage snapshots. Her photographs, films, installations, and images on paper and felt are most often comprised of fragmented or accumulated images and sometimes text, which conjure a compelling sense of narrative when assembled as tableaux.
Curator: Siri Engberg
