Jenny Holzer
Jenny Holzer (American, born 1950), Selection from Survival: It is in your self-interest…, 2015, Carrara White marble bench. Courtesy of the artist and Cheim & Read. © 2020 Jenny Holzer, member Artists Rights Society (ARS), NY.
Jenny Holzer (American, born 1950), Selection from Survival: It is in your self-interest…, 2015, Carrara White marble bench. Courtesy of the artist and Cheim & Read. © 2020 Jenny Holzer, member Artists Rights Society (ARS), NY.
American artist Jenny Holzer has been using language as her medium for over 40 years. Selection from Survival: It is in your self-interest…, was on view in front of Rock Center through March of 2019. The text on the bench, which states, “It is in your self-interest to find a way to be very tender,” is from her Survival series of 1983–1985. For the initial series, Holzer printed the statements on electronic signs and aluminum plaques; later she had the texts etched into stone benches.
Holzer has had exhibitions at the Whitney Museum of American Art, Louvre Abu Dhabi, and the Guggenheim Museums in New York and Bilbao. She received the Leone d’Oro at the Venice Biennale in 1990, the World Economic Forum’s Crystal Award in 1996, and the Barnard Medal of Distinction in 2011. She holds honorary degrees from Williams College, the Rhode Island School of Design, The New School, and Smith College. She lives and works in New York and is represented by Cheim & Read.