Barbara Kruger

‘American graphic designer Barbara Kruger culled photographically derived mass-media images for use in an extensive series of confrontational poster-like pictures based on postmodern assumptions about women in society…. she inserted bold, bocky type derived from advertising into her compositions, both as design elements and for their meaning’ (Warner Marien 2010 p.452)

‘I shop, therefore I am’ and ‘Your body is a battleground’, are some of Kruger’s instantly recognizable slogans. Kruger’s work explores and opens a dialogue on issues of feminism, desire, consumerism and self-determination. She often commentes on current politics, as can be seen  with her New York magazine cover, in which she calls Donald Trump a ‘Loser’.

‘I never say I do political art. Nor do I do feminist art. I’m a woman who’s a feminist, who makes art. But I think what becomes visible and what work remains absent is always the result of historical circumstance’ (Kruger 2013).

Reference

Bollen, C. (2013) ‘Barbara Kruger’, Andy Warhol’s Interview [online], 13 Feb, available: https://www.interviewmagazine.com/art/barbara-kruger [accessed 23 May 2018].

Kruger, B. (2018) Barbara Kruger [online], available: http://www.barbarakruger.com [accessed 23 May 2018].

MoMA (2018) Barbara Kruger [online], available: https://www.moma.org/artists/3266 [accessed 23 May 2018].

Warner Marien, M. (2010) Photography: A Cultural History, 3rd ed., London: Laurence King.