The past 50 years have seen the incorporation of new disciplines, new technologies and new platforms of expression by artists from all fields. The Living End exhibition at the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago focuses on painting, examining the questions presented by these innovations, countering the recycled discourse that “painting is dead”.
Cutting across geographies, histories and contexts, The Living End explores the different methods artists have used to challenge or intervene in the practice of painting and the role of painters over the past 50 years. The suggestion is that painting is a living art, in a constant state of renewal and rebirth.
From the experiments with computer-assisted graphics in the mid-1960s to the prevalence of screens and artists mining online digital and social media culture today, the show considers the impact of various representational technologies and production methods, such as the use of video and still cameras; computers, the internet and screens; automation; and the performing body. Comprising paintings, performances, videos and installations, The Living End explores the ways artists working across media have challenged the mythologies of painting, ultimately changing our understanding of what art constitutes.
Left: Cheryl Donegan, Whoa Whoa Studio (for Courbet), 2000. Video (colour, sound); 3m 21s. Courtesy Electronic Arts Intermix, New York. Right: Avery Singer, The Studio Visit, 2012. Acrylic on canvas. Private collection. © Avery Singer. Courtesy of the artist and Hauser & Wirth. Photo: Roman März.
The curators – Jamillah James and Jack Schneider – have emphasised the critical reading of the painting, its tropes, its prominence in the Western canon, and its historical associations with privilege. As technology increases access to the means of production, the model of the painter as a singular “genius” is being decentralised, opening abstract and representational painting to new perspectives.
Particularly interesting is the study of the cyclical relationship between still photography and painting, as well as how video has allowed artists working in performance the possibility of critiquing the trajectory and status of painting. Lastly, The Living End exhibition looks at the automation of painting, where the artist’s hand is largely absent, complicating the role of the artist as producer and the market’s enduring interest in painting as a commodity.
Author: Lavinia Dickson-Robinson
The Living End: Painting and Other Technologies, 1970–2020
Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, 220 E Chicago Ave, Chicago, IL 60611
9th November 2024 – 23th March 2025
More information and tickets HERE.
Opening image: Tala Madani, Solitaire (still), 2023. Single-channel color animation; 5 minutes, 58 seconds. Courtesy the artist; 303 Gallery, New York; and Pilar Corrias, London.
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