Barbara Kruger
Personal Background
Barbara Kruger is an American artist, born (1945) and raised in Newark, New Jersey. Kruger's mother was a legal secretary and her father, a chemical technician. An only child, Kruger lived a normal, upper-middle class childhood. She attended Weequahic High School in Newark and later Syracuse University. However, the death of her father caused Kruger to return home from Syracuse after only a year. She did not end up finishing her degree at Syracuse, but instead transferred to Parsons School of Design, seeking more advanced art education. Here, Kruger found herself frustrated and ultimately "disillusioned with art school." She looked to a professor and mentor of hers, Marvin Israel, for help. He advised her to put together a professional portfolio, which re-sparked her interest.
Style
Barbara Kruger's style is quite distinct. Most of her artwork contains an appropriated black-and-white photograph; that is to say, an image that Kruger did not take. The images she tends to use are from magazines, advertisements, etc. Her primary principle of choice is interaction of text and image, which she uses in essentially all of her art works. When ruminated upon, Kruger's style is truly a combination of many postmodern principles. The aforementioned ones as well as recontextualization and gazing.
Philosophy
The major ideas behind Kruger's work revolve around societal and political criticism. Kruger wanted to draw attention to the hypocrisy she observed in American society in the 1970s and beyond. Using her artwork she protested political stances, cultural norms, common sayings, etc. To an extent, her artwork was also an expression of herself; her thoughts, ideas, emotions, etc.
Influences
Barbara Kruger's work has influenced me to try to communicate my own discomforts with the world through my photographs. Though I prefer to upload/create straight photographs, I still attempt to communicate emotion, transience, and other aspects of life that I find puzzling and/or interesting. Instead of placing text over my images, I attempt to let the picture/s "speak." Kruger has also influenced me to
Barbara Kruger is an American artist, born (1945) and raised in Newark, New Jersey. Kruger's mother was a legal secretary and her father, a chemical technician. An only child, Kruger lived a normal, upper-middle class childhood. She attended Weequahic High School in Newark and later Syracuse University. However, the death of her father caused Kruger to return home from Syracuse after only a year. She did not end up finishing her degree at Syracuse, but instead transferred to Parsons School of Design, seeking more advanced art education. Here, Kruger found herself frustrated and ultimately "disillusioned with art school." She looked to a professor and mentor of hers, Marvin Israel, for help. He advised her to put together a professional portfolio, which re-sparked her interest.
Style
Barbara Kruger's style is quite distinct. Most of her artwork contains an appropriated black-and-white photograph; that is to say, an image that Kruger did not take. The images she tends to use are from magazines, advertisements, etc. Her primary principle of choice is interaction of text and image, which she uses in essentially all of her art works. When ruminated upon, Kruger's style is truly a combination of many postmodern principles. The aforementioned ones as well as recontextualization and gazing.
Philosophy
The major ideas behind Kruger's work revolve around societal and political criticism. Kruger wanted to draw attention to the hypocrisy she observed in American society in the 1970s and beyond. Using her artwork she protested political stances, cultural norms, common sayings, etc. To an extent, her artwork was also an expression of herself; her thoughts, ideas, emotions, etc.
Influences
Barbara Kruger's work has influenced me to try to communicate my own discomforts with the world through my photographs. Though I prefer to upload/create straight photographs, I still attempt to communicate emotion, transience, and other aspects of life that I find puzzling and/or interesting. Instead of placing text over my images, I attempt to let the picture/s "speak." Kruger has also influenced me to
Barbara Kruger, untitled, 2016.
Barbara Kruger, untitled, 1989
My Images
Grace Krueger, DANCE IN THE FACE OF EVIL, 2018.
Compare / Contrast
Both of these images have a political theme/tone because of the person who is in the photograph; Donald Trump. The photos are also both degrading him in some way. My photograph differs from Kruger's in that it is not a magazine cover, nor does the writing cover Mr. Trump's nose.
These images both have environment themes. They are very different because one is a photograph and the other is an illustration. Both use the postmodern principle Interaction of Text and Image. Both criticize the outlook our society has (or doesn't have) on environmental conservation.
Both images have themes of consumerism/advertisement. The left image is not branded but the right image is associated with a certain brand; RayBan. The color schemes in these two images differ; red and black/white and blue and black/white.
Both images contain photographs of women who work in/for the U.S. Government. Hillary Clinton and Ruth Bader Ginsburg. Again, the two images have different color schemes. One is entirely black and white while the other contains red. Both images have a message of fighting for what is right and discontinuing or stopping what is not right.
These two images have the same color scheme, as well as a theme of death/killing. Both images have skulls in them too. In one image, apathy is doing the killing and in the other, some unidentified entity is killing time.
OVERALL ARTIST STATEMENT
I really enjoyed crafting the images for this project in the style of Barbara Kruger. I tried my best to edit images that showed my opinion and outlook in them and were also visually pleasing. I am very happy with how all of the images turned out. I have learned a lot during this project about editing and how to use Photoshop. In addition, I really got to see all of the postmodern principles in action.
- Grace Krueger, artist
- Grace Krueger, artist
Resources
http://www.theartstory.org/artist-kruger-barbara.htm
https://www.thefamouspeople.com/profiles/barbara-kruger-798.php
www.arthistoryarchive.com/arthistory/feminist/Barbara-Kruger.html
https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/barbara-kruger-donald-trump_us_5817bbbae4b064e1b4b4647c
http://www.theartstory.org/artist-kruger-barbara.htm
https://www.thefamouspeople.com/profiles/barbara-kruger-798.php
www.arthistoryarchive.com/arthistory/feminist/Barbara-Kruger.html
https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/barbara-kruger-donald-trump_us_5817bbbae4b064e1b4b4647c