Madison Museum of Contemporary Art (MMoCA) and the University of Wisconsin-Madison campus are among dozens of fixed and mobile sites nationwide that will be hosting a series of election-year themed artworks envisioned by Jenny Holzer, a New York-based artist for the YOUVOTE campaign.
“We are honored to work with Madison Arts Commission and the Art Department and First Wave Scholars Program at UW-Madison, and for MMoCA to serve as a site for Jenny Holzer’s YOUVOTE project,” said Christina Brungardt, the Gabriele Haberland Director of MMoCA, in a statement. “From her early Truisms featured in New York City’s Times Square to present, Holzer has activated public spaces to create meaningful dialogue with communities about pressing social issues and personal responsibilities.”
In anticipation of the 2020 U.S. presidential and congressional elections, Jenny Holzer Studio is mobilizing a series of artworks in key areas through the swing states of Wisconsin, Michigan, North Carolina, and Pennsylvania that will champion broad political engagement, issue awareness, and voter empowerment. For more than 40 years, Jenny Holzer has presented her astringent ideas, arguments, and sorrows in public places and international exhibitions, including 7 World Trade Center, the Venice Biennale, the Guggenheim Museums in New York and Bilbao, the Whitney Museum of American Art, and the Louvre Abu Dhabi.
The Madison component of the project is a joint effort between MMoCA, the Madison Arts Commission, the University of Wisconsin-Madison Art Department, Office of Multicultural Arts Initiatives-First Wave Scholars and the campus chapter of the American Institute of Graphic Arts (AIGA). Also collaborating are Frank Productions, whose theaters The Sylvee, The Orpheum, and The Majestic, will be used as polling locations, and The Barrymore, which will host YOUVOTE messages on its marquee.
The project launched this past weekend with a mural on the boards covering MMoCA’s Henry Street windows, which were damaged last May following peaceful protests against the police killing of George Floyd. The selected quote by Sojourner Truth – “Truth is powerful and will prevail” is particularly poignant and timely in relation to not only the election and raising awareness of social justice, MMoCA says, but also Holzer’s own practice of reflecting on truth in her work.
UW-Madison students, working with Henrique Nardi, an instructor of graphic design for the UW-Madison Art Department, used a projector so they could trace the letters of the murals which they painted on Sunday. The art students are Austen Wallenfang, Eury Kim, Gayatri Visvanathan, Kaylene Yong, Madeleine Freitag, Nicole Golownia, and Yuheng Chen.
“Voting is a fundamental avenue for expressing one’s political voice in our democracy. Every election is important, but the myriad challenges we currently face heighten the importance of the election this November,” said Madison Mayor Satya Rhodes-Conway in a statement. “Holzer’s work is impactful because it uses simple messages to engage the viewer and draw their attention to the topic at hand. It is my hope that her work will delight and inspire people who see it, and encourage everyone to vote this fall.”
Other YOUVOTE artworks in the coming weeks will include banners on bridges over Park Street and Campus Drive, LED boards on trucks, and artwork on city utility boxes. Original texts for these additional installations will be supplied by UW-Madison First Wave scholars.
