Kirk Varnedoe: In the Middle at the Modern

Telfair Museums, Savannah, GA, September 22, 2017 - February 11, 2018

From the Telfair Museums' website:

Kirk Varnedoe: In the Middle at the Modern is a multimedia exhibition that challenges reality, questions authenticity, and ignites discussions about the power of museums to bestow objects with “high” or “low” value. Curated by Triple Candie, a phantom-like institution run by internationally-noted art historians Shelly Bancroft and Peter Nesbett, the exhibition reflects on Varnedoe’s contributions to curatorial practice by examining his first major exhibition, High and Low: Modern Art and Popular Culture (Museum of Modern Art, New York, 1990), now with the hindsight of three decades.

Varnedoe (American, 1946–2003) was a figure deeply connected to Savannah as a celebrated native who achieved the status of a national art-world legend. In his role as chief curator of painting and sculpture at MoMA (1988–2001), he set in motion vital debates about art that continue to reverberate today. Blending personal biography with historical scholarship, this exhibition uses fabricated objects in the form of altered documents, sculptural recreations, photographs, sets, animations, modified posters, ephemera, and wall texts. Triple Candie’s curatorial directive is to raise questions about art and the often-unquestioned ideas surrounding it, such as originality, authenticity, influence, history, and value.

This exhibition is commissioned and organized by Telfair Museums, and curated by Triple Candie in collaboration with Rachel Reese, Associate Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art.