Positive Fragmentation

Positive Fragmentation: From the Collection of Jordan D. Schnitzer and His Family Foundation

For many artists, the act of creation begins with one of destruction as they dissect shape, color, perspective, text, idea, or stereotype. For some, the result is enough: pulling apart and fragmenting images and ideas exposes what lies beneath or heralds the inherent value of each part. Other artists assemble fragments to create a new whole defined by its different parts. This exhibition explores the impulses that drive these creative approaches in the work of contemporary artists.

Positive Fragmentation includes over 180 prints drawn from the Collections of Jordan D. Schnitzer and His Family Foundation, each a work by a contemporary artist who employs fragmentation in different ways. Feminist scholar and critic, Lucy Lippard, describes positive fragmentation, or the "collage aesthetic," as particularly suited to historically marginalized artists (including women), as it "willfully takes apart what is or is supposed to be and rearranges it in ways that suggest what it could be."

Artists

Polly Apfelbaum Jennifer Bartlett Christiane Baumgartner Louise Bourgeois Cecily Brown Nicole Eisenman Ellen Gallagher Jenny Holzer Nicola Lopez Julie Mehretu Sarah Morris Wangechi Mutu Judy Pfaff Wendy Red Star Betye Saar Lorna Simpson Swoon Barbara Takenaga Mickalene Thomas Kara Walker

Organized by the National Museum of Women in the Arts Curated by Virginia Treanor, Senior Curator, National Museum of Women in the Arts; and Kathryn Wat, Deputy Director for Art, Programs, and Public Engagement, and Chief Curator, National Museum of Women in the Arts