Joan Jonas. Light Time Tales

About

Malmö Konsthall presents Light Time Tales, a landmark retrospective exhibition of works by Joan Jonas. A key figure in art for the past fifty years, her work continues to evolve and to break down disciplinary boundaries.

Held in collaboration with HangarBicocca (Milan), Light Time Tales is the largest ever exhibition in Scandinavia devoted to the American artist, presenting multimedia installations and videos and placing new productions alongside foundational works. The exhibition also highlights Jonas’s pioneering research into the medium of video/film and performance. 

The exhibition comprises four large-scale installations, including one from the MoMA collection (Museum of Modern Art), New York City, and several single-channel videos, which together create a constellation of Joan Jonas’s most important works. These range from Mirage (1976/1994/2005) to the more recent Reanimation (2010/2012/2013) andDouble Lunar Rabbits (2010). The accompanying films and videos similarly span from the late 1960s up to the present day.

Light Time Tales offers insights into the dynamic artistic career of Joan Jonas. A great experimenter who is always exploring new multi-disciplinary collaborations, Jonas has invented a personal artistic language that interweaves video, installation and performance, creating a constant renewal of figurative art—with formal signatures that continue to inspire new generations of artists.

Light Time Tales was originally presented at HangarBicocca between 2 October 2014 and 1 February 2015, and curated by Andrea Lissoni with the curatorial assistance of Fiammetta Griccioli. The exhibition at Malmö Konsthall is co-curated by Andrea Lissoni and Diana Baldon. 

To accompany the two exhibitions, Gregory R. Miller & Co. in association with Hatje Cantz, HangarBicocca and Malmö Konsthall have published the most comprehensive monograph to date on the work of the artist. 

In November, Malmö Konsthall in collaboration with Malmö Art Academy, Lund University, and Schools of Visual Art, Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts, are planning a conference. Details are forthcoming.

Joan Jonas (b. 1936 in New York, USA) is one of the first female artists to combine video and performance and is the author of reference books on performance art. Since the 1960s she has explored the theme of identity and the relationship between the body and its representation. Jonas is currently representing the United States of America at the 56th Venice Biennale with a new commission presented by the MIT List Visual Arts Center, Massachusetts.

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More about the artist
Welcome to the opening Friday September 25, 6-9 p.m.