Until April 07, 2024, the Guggenheim’s New York art center is pleased to present the exhibition “Going Dark: The Contemporary Figure at the Edge of Visibility“. This immersive, never-before-seen exhibition brings together an impressive cohort of talented contemporary artists. Highlighting a body of work with dark, barely perceptible nuances, these contemporary artists seek to interrogate the public’s visual perspectives on what it means to be seen and to actually see oneself.
Located in the famous rotunda of the Guggenheim’s museum space, the exhibition “Going Dark: The Contemporary Figure at the Edge of Visibility” features over 100 works by a group of 28 artists, mostly black and female. These multi-generational works, exhibited in the museum, come from a variety of eras.
Although most of the works date from the 1980s to the present day, some were created in the 1960s and 1970s by iconic artists such as David Hammons, Faith Ringgold and Charles White. This observation suggests that the rise of conceptual art over these decades opened up new avenues of expression that laid the foundations for contemporary artists exploring the “limit of visibility” today.
The works in the exhibition reveal partially obscured or hidden figures, creating a dimension at the frontier of the visible. The artists present deliberately darkened bodies to explore a key tension in contemporary society: the desire to be seen and the desire to be hidden.
This exhibition offers a different take on the “go dark” concept, in which the exhibiting artists use various strategies to partially or thoroughly obscure their creations, like shadows enveloping the works. Using various methods such as body rotation forms, blurred or lightened effects in post-production, new materials and printing techniques, the artists offer an obscured visual aspect to their works.
Some more recent creations are displayed under chromatic green or blue lighting, reinforcing the theme of subdued luminosity at the heart of the exhibition. The works oscillate fluidly between figuration and abstraction, the artists aesthetically manipulating color and light to darken optical perception, calling into question the very nature of vision.
Through a variety of media including sculpture, painting, installation, photography and video, “Going Dark: The Contemporary Figure at the Edge of Visibility” explores the semi-visible figure, highlighting its importance in contemporary art as a genre with unique conceptual and formal power. This monumental, immersive exhibition, organized by Ashley James, Associate Curator of Contemporary Art, in collaboration with Faith Hunter, Assistant Curator, will take over the six ramps of the Guggenheim Museum’s iconic rotunda.
Artists whose work will be on view include American Artist, Kevin Beasley, Rebecca Belmore, Dawoud Bey, John Edmonds, Ellen Gallagher, David Hammons, Lyle Ashton Harris, Tomashi Jackson, Titus Kaphar, Glenn Ligon, Kerry James Marshall, Tiona Nekkia McClodden, Joiri Minaya, Sandra Mujinga, Chris Ofili, Sondra Perry, Farah Al Qasimi, Faith Ringgold, Doris Salcedo, Lorna Simpson, Ming Smith, Sable Elyse Smith, Stephanie Syjuco, Hank Willis Thomas, WangShui, Carrie Mae Weems and Charles White.
In a partially or literally obscured environment, “Going Dark: The Contemporary Figure at the Edge of Visibility” presents creations that question the viewer’s visual capacity, oscillating between clarity and occlusion. This is a unique opportunity to discover the creativity of the artists who have contributed to this major exhibition.