Paul Pfeiffer: Prologue to the Story of the Birth of Freedom
Paul Pfeiffer: Prologue to the Story of the Birth of Freedom presents 25 years of work from artist Paul Pfeiffer (b. 1966, Honolulu, HI; lives in New York, NY), whose practice interrogates ideas of spectacle and mass culture. By repurposing the tools and systems of media production鈥攊ncluding editing, staging, and outsourcing鈥擯feiffer recontextualizes global celebrities such as pop stars, film actors, and athletes to reveal relationships between audiences and icons. As the artist puts it, 鈥渨ho鈥檚 using who? Is the image making us, or do we make images?鈥�
Whether through televised broadcasts of sporting events, editorial photographs of cultural icons, or the ecstasy of a soccer stadium, Pfeiffer interrogates the consumption of images and culture. For Pfeiffer, the basketball court, the boxing ring, and the stadium not only serve as platforms for grand spectacles but as sites where the body politic鈥攐f a nation, of a community, of society鈥攊s imagined, defined, and contested.
Spanning two and a half decades of work, the exhibition features works by Pfeiffer in the MCA Collection, including Fragments of a Crucifixion (After Francis Bacon) (1999) and Study for Morning After the Deluge (2001), as well as Self-Portrait as a Fountain (2000), which is part of the recent D.Daskalopoulos Collection Gift. This exhibition is the MCA鈥檚 fourth that centrally features Pfeiffer鈥檚 work, following his career-defining solo show Paul Pfeiffer in 2003, MCA Screen: Paul Pfeiffer in 2018, and Fragments of a Crucifixion in 2019. The accompanying catalogue for this exhibition includes an interview from Fragments of a Crucifixion between Pfeiffer and former MCA Marjorie Susan Curatorial Fellow Chanon Kenji Praepipatmangkol, and features contributions from University of Chicago Professor Emeritus Tom Gunning, artist Julie Mehretu, and historian Lawrence Chua.
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Paul Pfeiffer: Prologue to the Story of the Birth of Freedom presents 25 years of work from artist Paul Pfeiffer (b. 1966, Honolulu, HI; lives in New York, NY), whose practice interrogates ideas of spectacle and mass culture. By repurposing the tools and systems of media production鈥攊ncluding editing, staging, and outsourcing鈥擯feiffer recontextualizes global celebrities such as pop stars, film actors, and athletes to reveal relationships between audiences and icons. As the artist puts it, 鈥渨ho鈥檚 using who? Is the image making us, or do we make images?鈥�
Whether through televised broadcasts of sporting events, editorial photographs of cultural icons, or the ecstasy of a soccer stadium, Pfeiffer interrogates the consumption of images and culture. For Pfeiffer, the basketball court, the boxing ring, and the stadium not only serve as platforms for grand spectacles but as sites where the body politic鈥攐f a nation, of a community, of society鈥攊s imagined, defined, and contested.
Spanning two and a half decades of work, the exhibition features works by Pfeiffer in the MCA Collection, including Fragments of a Crucifixion (After Francis Bacon) (1999) and Study for Morning After the Deluge (2001), as well as Self-Portrait as a Fountain (2000), which is part of the recent D.Daskalopoulos Collection Gift. This exhibition is the MCA鈥檚 fourth that centrally features Pfeiffer鈥檚 work, following his career-defining solo show Paul Pfeiffer in 2003, MCA Screen: Paul Pfeiffer in 2018, and Fragments of a Crucifixion in 2019. The accompanying catalogue for this exhibition includes an interview from Fragments of a Crucifixion between Pfeiffer and former MCA Marjorie Susan Curatorial Fellow Chanon Kenji Praepipatmangkol, and features contributions from University of Chicago Professor Emeritus Tom Gunning, artist Julie Mehretu, and historian Lawrence Chua.
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Paul Pfeiffer鈥檚 current exhibit at the MCA is the finale in a trifecta of video exhibitions held by the institution, succeeding knockout shows by Mona Hatoum and Arthur Jafa.
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