New work, Kara Walker


Sikkema Jenkins & Co. is pleased to announce a solo exhibition of new work by Kara Walker, on view from October 20 – November 21.

The exhibition features work from the new series Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen and Abandoned Lands- Records, "Miscellaneous Papers" National Archives M809 Roll 23, named after the historical records of the "Freedmen's Bureau" that document, among other things, atrocities against freed blacks during Reconstruction. Each work borrows its title, misused as a kind of free verse, and subject from this historical record. The small cut-outs that make up this series reflect on the sad, repetitive nature of racist atrocities.

Beginning with the phrase "A Painting is a Nigger, an object without use value," Search for ideas supporting the Black Man as a work of Modern Art / Contemporary Painting; a death without end, and an appreciation of the Creative Spirit of Lynch Mobs-, is largely about the dissolution of black subjectivity and meaning in the context of four large white panels and several smaller (colorful) ones, all with collage elements including Walker's signature silhouettes. Also featured is a single work consisting of 52 handwritten texts, in which the artist considers the "perpetrator", torturer, murderer, as well as willing and unwilling victims of circumstance.

Kara Walker is the recipient of numerous grants and fellowships including the John D. and Catherine T MacArthur Foundation Achievement Award (1997), the Deutsche Bank Prize (2004), and the Larry Aldrich Award (2005).

Walker's works have been exhibited internationally in numerous group and solo shows. Kara Walker: My Complement, My Enemy, My Oppressor, My Love, the artist's first full-scale museum survey, premiered at the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis in February 2007, and will be on view at the Whitney Museum of American Art from October 11, 2007 through February 3, 2008. The exhibition will also travel to the Hammer Museum in Los Angeles (March 2 - June 8, 2008).

For additional information contact Ellie Bronson at 212.929.2262, or ellie@sikkemajenkinsco.com.