A Show of Affection - Collection Constellation 1
Fotomuseum Winterthur, Winterthur, SwitzerlandCurator: Fotomuseum Winterthur
Artists: Vito Acconci, Stefan Burger, Forensic Architecture, Lee Friedlander, Matthias Gabi, Nan Goldin, Roc Herms, Jacob Holdt, Margret Hoppe, Graciela Iturbide, Zoe Leonard, Marc Lee, Sherrie Levine, Clunie Reid, Anika Schwarzlose, Shirana Shahbazi, Cindy Sherman, Lorna Simpson and Garry Winogrand
Fotomuseum, Winterthur
A Show of Affection – Collection Constellation 1
Looking back on a 30-year institutional history, Fotomuseum Winterthur is showcasing works from its collection while interrogating some of the steps in its development. The exhibition highlights the collection’s distinctive features and focal points along with representative works, while also giving insight into the museum’s collection practices. A critical examination of one’s own collection inevitably reveals gaps and omissions as well as challenging acquisitions, which are also looked at as part of the process of exploration.
A Show of Affection – Collection Constellation 1 is conceived as a non-linear exploration of the collection of Fotomuseum Winterthur that interweaves the presentation of selected works with an examination of and reflection on the collection. Using parameters such as institutional history, social changes and the evolution of photographic media and practices, an alternative approach to the format of the collection exhibition is sketched out, offering parallel narratives and perspectives on collection care and development. The multifaceted approach highlights how the ongoing evolution of a collection is invariably influenced by a wide range of different factors, which include cultural and political changes along with contextual considerations and debates and shifting curatorial interests and areas of focus. Just as importantly, A Show of Affection expresses an institutional stance, which reveals the museum’s collection practice as a (self‑)critical, yet affectionate process of exploration.
The collection of Fotomuseum Winterthur comprises international artistic positions that have close historical and institutional links with the museum’s exhibition programme. It includes around 9,000 photographic objects – photographs, documents, installative works and moving images. The collection’s earliest works date from the 1960s and its most recent belong to the immediate present. It contains works not only by internationally renowned photographers – such as Sophie Calle, Robert Frank, Nan Goldin, Boris Mikhailov and Dayanita Singh – but also by a young generation of interdisciplinary artists like Laia Abril, Anna Ehrenstein and John Yuyi, while including vernacular photography too. It has five principal areas of emphasis: documentary-narrative photography; conceptual photography and artistic photography with a focus on media analysis; post-photographic works that challenge, reflect on and extend the various forms of the photographic in the context of digital image practices and technologies; works by young photographers; and ephemeral works and print objects such as brochures, pamphlets, posters and postcards.
Collection Constellation 1 marks the beginning of a series of collection presentations that build on one another and are conceived for different international venues.
Exhibited Artwork
The Show Must Go On. Social Media Fights for the Presidency!
Online TV ShowThe US presidential election is a product manufactured for the big stage of TV: here, orchestrated reality TV shows are sold as political debates, and ‘stars’ like Donald Trump conquer the stage by establishing ‘perceived facts’ and telling blatant lies. Political opinion is served as easily digestible nibbles that circulate across the digital channels of social media. Twitter, Facebook more …
Fotomuseum, Winterthur
Fotomuseum, Winterthur
Fotomuseum, Winterthur