Alex Bag

Alex Bag (* 1969 in New York City , New York ) is an American artist who critically accompanies the mass medium of television and the art business, primarily with video art .

life and work

Alex Bag's father worked in advertising. In her childhood, Alex Bag's professional productions seemed to be "just as exciting and important as traditional fine arts." After graduating with a Bachelor of Fine Arts from Cooper Union College in 1991, Alex Bag had her first solo exhibition in 1994 at New York's "303 Gallery", which represents well-known contemporary artists. Alex Bag has taught at Yale University , the Parsons School of Design , the Californian Institute of the Arts , and has worked at the Getty Research Institute .

Interactions between high and popular culture become visible in Alex Bag's works. The artist also analyzes structural characteristics and economic laws of the art world. Different areas of media and consumer culture are touched, such as soap operas, fashion and advertising. Often it is about television culture: "Television is terrible, but I can't stop watching. It is so much expected that your free time should be such that it is acceptable to just spend the time as an absorber and a zombie. I feel forced me to answer it in order to react somehow as a human. " In her video performances , which she contrasts with the mass medium of television, Alex Bag appears in a multitude of roles with irony and humor.

Although Alex Bag, like the Pop Artists, refers to pop culture and mass media, her work is socially critical. "There are many good sides to pop art, but also terrible ones, I think. Pop artists accepted their situation and allowed themselves to point to the world around them, to look at it, to be inspired by it and to examine it in order not to be isolated from her in the ivory tower. But at the same time they limited themselves so much to the gloss of the surfaces. They repeat popular imagery without really saying anything, it is free from politics. "

Artistic work

In the video Untitled Fall '95 (1995) Alex Bag plays a fictional art student who tells about her alleged life and studies at the School of Visual Arts , one of the leading private art schools in New York City. As in a video diary, the student speaks thoughts on life and art directly into the camera. The sections of the diary are separated or supplemented by clips on different topics. In terms of content, the video plays with the romantic notion of the artist and the disillusionment in the art world.

In the video Untitled (Project for the Andy Warhol Museum) (1996) the experience of zapping and canal surfing is repeated. The short commercials, excerpts from talk shows with TV celebrities, soap operas and news programs are produced by the artist herself.

Performances

1995 Thread Waxing Space, New York
1996 The Alterknit Theater. The Knitting Factory , New York
1996 "Utopian Art Festival." Hotel 17, New York
1996 "Circus of the Stars." Hotel 17, New York

Solo exhibitions

1994 303 Gallery, New York
1996 Andy Warhol Museum, Pittsburgh
1996 Emi Fontana Gallery, Milan, Italy
1996 Marta Cervera Gallery, Madrid
1998 Zaal de Unie, Rotterdam
1999 Almine Rech Gallery, Paris
2000 12 spells. American Fine Arts Co., New York
2000 All You Need is Love. Laznia Center for Contemporary Art (Centrum Sztuki Współczesnej ŁAŹNIA), Gdansk, Poland
2002 crack up. American Fine Arts Co., New York
2004 Coven Services for Consumer Mesmerism, Product Sorcery, and the Necromantic Reimagination of Consumption. Elizabeth Dee Gallery, New York
2009 Alex Bag. The Whitney Museum of American Art, New York
2011 Alex Bag. Migros Museum for Contemporary Art, Zurich

Participation in exhibitions

1997 Up Close and Personal. Philadelphia Museum of Art , Philadelphia, PA
2000 performing bodies. Tate Gallery , London
2000 Elysian Fields. Center Georges Pompidou , Paris
2005 Day Labor. MoMA PS1 , Long Island City, NY
2005 BMW. The IX Baltic Triennial of International Art , Contemporary Art Center, Vilnius, Lithuania
2005 When Humor Becomes Painful. Migros Museum for Contemporary Art, Zurich
2006 Alex Bag, Mike Kelley, Richard Hoeck & John Miller, Babylon Kino, Berlin
2007 Beneath the Underdog. Gagosian Gallery , New York

literature

1996 - Glenn O'Brien : Who's That Girl? frieze magazine, (English)
2004 - David Frankel: TV, or Not TV. Artforum, (English)
2008 - Karen Rosenberg: What's on the Art Box? Spins, Satire and Camp. The New York Times, (English)
2009 - Howard Halle: Alex Bag. Time Out New York, (English)
2011 - Kito Nedo: Trash, Cash, Mashup. art, (German)

Web links

Arttattler Archive Alex Bag Video stills and exhibition texts (English)

Individual evidence

^ David Frankel: TV, or not TV: David Frankel on Alex Bag. In: Artforum International. The Free Library, October 1, 2004, accessed on March 21, 2012 (English): "That always seemed like something just as exciting and important as traditional kinds of fine art."
^ David Frankel: TV, or not TV: David Frankel on Alex Bag. In: Artforum International . The Free Library, October 1, 2004, accessed on March 20, 2012 (English): “Television is the most awful thing, (…) but I can't stop watching it. It's so expected that that's what your leisure time is supposed to be - that the accepted way to spend your free time is just to be an absorber, a zombie. I feel compelled to talk back - to respond in some way as a human being. "
^ David Frankel: TV, or not TV: David Frankel on Alex Bag. In: Artforum International. The Free Library, October 1, 2004, accessed on March 21, 2012 : “There are so many good things about Pop art, but other things I think are awful. The Pop artists accepted their place and time and allowed themselves to reference the world around them, look at it, be inspired by it, examine it, not be so isolated from it, not be in an ivory tower. But at the same time they limited themselves by being so much about surface gloss. They repeat popular imagery without saying anything, really; it's devoid of politics. "
↑ Alex Bag. Ubuweb, accessed on March 24, 2012 (English): “In Alex Bag's ironic performance videos, the artist adopts a series of personae to create droll conceptual parodies. With her signature deadpan delivery and deliberately low-tech style, bag mixes the vernacular of pop culture with irreverently humorous monologues. Performing in multiple guises amidst fragments of pop detritus, bag skewers the tropes of consumer and media culture. Questioning how we define ourselves in relation to television, fashion, advertising and the artworld, she creates mediated parodies that teeter between celebration and critique. "
↑ Alex Bag. Migros Museum, 2011, accessed on March 28, 2012 .
↑ Alex Bag: Untitled Fall '95. (FLV, Flash) Ubuweb, accessed on March 24, 2012 (English).
^ Untitled (Project for the Andy Warhol Museum). Electronic Arts Intermix, accessed March 31, 2012 .
↑ Alex Bag. Whitney Museum of American Art, 2009, accessed March 29, 2012 .
↑ BMW. The IX Baltic Triennial of International Art. CAC - The Contemporary Arts Center, 2005, accessed on March 28, 2012 (English): "Alex Bag presents The Coven Services for Consumer Mesmerism, Product Sorcery, and the Necromantic Reimagination of Consumption."
↑ Glenn O'Brien: Who's That Girl? (No longer available online.) Frieze magazine, 1996, archived from the original on February 23, 2014 ; accessed on March 29, 2012 (English).
^ David Frankel: TV, or not TV: David Frankel on Alex Bag. In: Artforum International. The Free Library, October 1, 2004, accessed March 21, 2012 .
^ Karen Rosenberg: What's on the Art Box? Spins, Satire and Camp. The New York Times, January 11, 2008, accessed March 29, 2012 .
↑ Howard Halle: Alex Bag. Time Out, January 29, 2009, accessed March 28, 2012 .
↑ Kito Nedo: Trash, Cash, Mashup. (No longer available online.) Art-magazin, July 12, 2011, archived from the original on July 18, 2011 ; Retrieved March 29, 2012 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2

personal data
SURNAME	Bag, Alex
BRIEF DESCRIPTION	American video artist
DATE OF BIRTH	1969
PLACE OF BIRTH	New York City , New York

[1] David Frankel: TV, or not TV: David Frankel on Alex Bag. In: Artforum International. The Free Library, October 1, 2004, accessed on March 21, 2012 (English): "That always seemed like something just as exciting and important as traditional kinds of fine art."

[2] David Frankel: TV, or not TV: David Frankel on Alex Bag. In: Artforum International . The Free Library, October 1, 2004, accessed on March 20, 2012 (English): “Television is the most awful thing, (…) but I can't stop watching it. It's so expected that that's what your leisure time is supposed to be - that the accepted way to spend your free time is just to be an absorber, a zombie. I feel compelled to talk back - to respond in some way as a human being. "

[3] David Frankel: TV, or not TV: David Frankel on Alex Bag. In: Artforum International. The Free Library, October 1, 2004, accessed on March 21, 2012 : “There are so many good things about Pop art, but other things I think are awful. The Pop artists accepted their place and time and allowed themselves to reference the world around them, look at it, be inspired by it, examine it, not be so isolated from it, not be in an ivory tower. But at the same time they limited themselves by being so much about surface gloss. They repeat popular imagery without saying anything, really; it's devoid of politics. "

[4] Alex Bag. Ubuweb, accessed on March 24, 2012 (English): “In Alex Bag's ironic performance videos, the artist adopts a series of personae to create droll conceptual parodies. With her signature deadpan delivery and deliberately low-tech style, bag mixes the vernacular of pop culture with irreverently humorous monologues. Performing in multiple guises amidst fragments of pop detritus, bag skewers the tropes of consumer and media culture. Questioning how we define ourselves in relation to television, fashion, advertising and the artworld, she creates mediated parodies that teeter between celebration and critique. "

[5] Alex Bag. Migros Museum, 2011, accessed on March 28, 2012 .

[6] Alex Bag: Untitled Fall '95. (FLV, Flash) Ubuweb, accessed on March 24, 2012 (English).

[7] Untitled (Project for the Andy Warhol Museum). Electronic Arts Intermix, accessed March 31, 2012 .

[8] Alex Bag. Whitney Museum of American Art, 2009, accessed March 29, 2012 .

[9] BMW. The IX Baltic Triennial of International Art. CAC - The Contemporary Arts Center, 2005, accessed on March 28, 2012 (English): "Alex Bag presents The Coven Services for Consumer Mesmerism, Product Sorcery, and the Necromantic Reimagination of Consumption."

[10] Glenn O'Brien: Who's That Girl? (No longer available online.) Frieze magazine, 1996, archived from the original on February 23, 2014 ; accessed on March 29, 2012 (English).

[11] David Frankel: TV, or not TV: David Frankel on Alex Bag. In: Artforum International. The Free Library, October 1, 2004, accessed March 21, 2012 .

[12] Karen Rosenberg: What's on the Art Box? Spins, Satire and Camp. The New York Times, January 11, 2008, accessed March 29, 2012 .

[13] Howard Halle: Alex Bag. Time Out, January 29, 2009, accessed March 28, 2012 .

[14] Kito Nedo: Trash, Cash, Mashup. (No longer available online.) Art-magazin, July 12, 2011, archived from the original on July 18, 2011 ; Retrieved March 29, 2012 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2