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Christopher Williams (American artist)

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Christopher Williams (born 1956 in Los Angeles) is an American conceptual artist and fine-art photographer[1] who lives in Cologne and works in Düsseldorf.[2]

Early life and education

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Williams was born in 1956 in Los Angeles, California. His father worked in Hollywood as a special effects artist.[3] In the 1970s and early 1980s, he studied at the California Institute of the Arts where he received his B.F.A. and M.F.A. under the first generation of West Coast conceptual artists[4][5] including John Baldessari, Michael Asher, and Douglas Huebler.

Work

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Writing in Artforum in 2007, art critic Tim Griffin described Williams's approach as sociophotographic[6] but more generally can be described as a political and historical practice. It has been said that Williams works within the tradition of institutional critique within what Sven Lütticken describes as an informal group, along with Willem de Rooij, Jeroen de Rijke and Mathias Poledna, that investigates the "parameters of the exhibition space."[7] Chronologically, however, he belongs to The Pictures Generation.[8] In 1982 Williams had his first solo exhibition at Jancar Kuhlenschmidt Gallery in Los Angeles. Angola to Vietnam is a photography portfolio of glass flowers.[9][10]

In 2000, at an exhibition at David Zwirner Gallery, in New York, Williams showed twenty photographs including a series of pictures of a 1964 Renault automobile on its side. Writing in The New York Times, Ken Johnson said, "the Renault was made in a French factory where significant revolutionary activities took place in 1968; hence it is tipped up like a barricade."[4]

Williams' photographs oftentimes show increasingly obsolescent film-based equipment—cameras, lenses and darkroom gear—as beautiful and precise as catalog product shots. The accompanying text adds detail about how the equipment was used.[11] Made by a professional photographer who follows Williams's directions,[2] the conventionally scaled pictures have the glossy lucidity of excellent commercial photographs.[4]

Educator

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Since October 2008 he has been a professor in photography at the Kunstakademie Düsseldorf.

Personal life

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Williams' wife Ann Goldstein is curator and deputy director and chair of modern and contemporary art at the Art Institute of Chicago.[12][13][14]

Publications

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  • Christopher Williams: The production Line of Happiness. ISBN 978-0300203905. Exhibition catalogue.
  • Christopher Williams: Printed in Germany. Walther König, 2014. ISBN 978-3863356002. Exhibition catalogue.

Exhibitions

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Solo exhibitions

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Exhibitions with others

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Awards

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References

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  1. ^ "ULAN Full Record Display (Getty Research)". Getty. Retrieved 2022-12-23.
  2. ^ a b "Christopher Williams: A Photographer Who Provokes". WSJ. 2013-05-18. Retrieved 2022-12-23.
  3. ^ [1] Christopher Williams MoMA
  4. ^ a b c "ART IN REVIEW; Christopher Williams". The New York Times. 2000-04-07. Retrieved 2022-12-23.
  5. ^ "Christopher Williams: The Production Line of Happiness, August 2 – November 2, 2014".
  6. ^ Tim Griffin "Christopher Williams: Galleria d'Arte Moderna, Bologna, Bologna," Artforum, January 2007.
  7. ^ Lütticken, 122
  8. ^ "'Production Line of Happiness' Is a 'Making Of' Special". The New York Times. 2014-07-31. Retrieved 2022-12-23.
  9. ^ This Will Have Been: Art, Love & Politics in the 1980s, February 11 – June 3, 2012 Archived February 3, 2014, at the Wayback Machine Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago.
  10. ^ "Christopher Williams (b. 1956)". Christie's Auctions & Private Sales. 2000-05-16. Retrieved 2022-12-23.
  11. ^ "With Cameras Optional, New Directions in Photography". The New York Times. 2014-01-23. Retrieved 2022-12-23.
  12. ^ "MOCA curator Ann Goldstein to lead Amsterdam's Stedelijk Museum*". Los Angeles Times. 2009-06-30. Retrieved 2022-12-23.
  13. ^ Organization: Directors: Ann Goldstein Archived November 30, 2012, at the Wayback Machine, Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam. Retrieved on 2012-09-27.
  14. ^ Nina Siegal, Restoring a Long-Missing Dutch Reference Point, The New York Times, 2012. Retrieved on 2012-09-27.
  15. ^ Zwirner, David. "Christopher Williams - Past Exhibitions". Retrieved 19 April 2013.
  16. ^ Boucher, Brian. "Christopher Williams Exhibition Will Hit Art Institute, MoMA". Archived from the original on 17 January 2013. Retrieved 19 April 2013.
  17. ^ "Christopher Williams | C/O Berlin".
  18. ^ "Christopher Williams | Neuebauer Collegium".
  19. ^ "Christopher Williams". John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation. Retrieved 30 October 2015.
  20. ^ "Christopher Williams". Archived from the original on 2015-04-19. Retrieved 2023-10-16.
  21. ^ "Announcing the Winners of The Paris Photo—Aperture Foundation PhotoBook Awards 2014", Aperture Foundation. Accessed 30 October 2015.
  22. ^ "Winners! Paris Photo–Aperture Foundation PhotoBook Awards 2014". LensCulture. 18 November 2014. Retrieved 30 October 2015.
  23. ^ Russeth, Andrew (14 November 2014). "Aperture Announces 2014 Photobook Awards". ARTnews. Retrieved 30 October 2015.

Literature

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