“I used language because I wanted to offer content that people – not necessarily art people – could understand”
—Jenny Holzer Opening with the remark “I DO NOT HEAR”, Jenny Holzer’s Blue Blue is a soundless installation piece that presents a cyclical text in cobalt LED lights. Presented in motion, much like a stock market ticker, the poetic narrative presents an emotive exploration of unhealthy relationships and their aftermaths. The phrases, which are written from the first person, poignantly convey this widely experienced trauma on a deeply personal level, allowing the personal experience to seep into collective politics and psychology. The lyrical movement of the text in Blue Blue was important to Holzer, and was the impetus for her use of electronic signs, “because motion is much like the spoken word… I write my text by saying the words out loud, or I write and then say words, to test them. Having text move is an extension of that process.”
Trading floor, New York, 1980s. Image: STOCKFOLIO® / Alamy Stock Photo
Holzer’s use of isolated, capitalised text is a conscious means to ensure the accessibility of her messages. This builds of the foundations of her artistic practise, which involved pasting posters on New York streets in the 1970s – an intentional mode of presentation intended to be viewed by as wide an audience as possible. Her messages span a range of mediums, from marble carving and t-shirts, to posters and light projections. LED signs such as Blue Blue evoke advertising and financial market displays, aligning with forms of mass-messaging. In doing so, Holzer harnesses this medium to showcase her captivating written words which examine the interplay between personal and shared experience.
“It is her attunement to the subtle balance between the aesthetic demands of form and the intellectual rigour required by the texts that make her work outstanding in the linguistic tradition of contemporary art.”
—Jörg Schellmann
Provenance
Personal copy of the publisher and part of the Archive of Edition Schellmann since time of publication
Literature
Jörg Schellmann, ed., Forty Are Better Than One, Munich/New York, 2009, pp. 158-159 ars publicata, Jenny Holzer Editions, 2003.01 [3]
Catalogue Essay
I DO NOT HEAR YOUR HAND ON THE LATCH. I WAKE TO YOU IN MY BED YOUR BACK AGAINST THE WALL. YOU ARE MY RIB HEADBOARD.
I KNOW YOUR SMELL. THERE IS NO WORK FOR MY EYES.
HALF AWARE I FEEL YOUR HAND MOVE AND THE PAIN IS YOUR SIGNATURE AND THE START.
WE ARE NO FIT. MY MOUTH PROVIDES COMFORT FOR US BUT THE MILK IS NO MILK THE NIPPLE NO BREAST THE BREASTS NOT MINE. MY PUZZLE STILL I AM AN INFANT AND YOU ARE NOT MY MOTHER.
I ASK THE RUG ON THE STAIR INTRICATE PATTERN HOLD THE SOUND. THERE IS BLOOD AND MORE BLOOD. THERE IS SHIT IN THE BLOOD. THIS IS NOT FEEDING TIME. I FIND MY SKIN A COVER OF SENSE THE ORDAINED EDGE BUT MY SKIN FAILS.
I GAPE FULL OF YOU NOT TAKEN ELSEWHERE.
YOU LOCK AND CONVULSE THEN EASE NEAR ME. I NEVER QUIET I AM AROUSED ALL THE TIME NOW. I WORK THE PAUSE IN THE NIGHT WHEN NO WOMEN GO ABOUT AND NO WOMEN COME WHEN CALLED.
I EXALT IN MY SKILL IN THE SHADE EYELESS BABY TRICKS TONGUE CURLED AROUND ALL SWEET BREATH AND I SHOW YOU THIS NOW AND KEEP IT FOR LATER.
MY ROOM HAS FOUR DOORS NOT ALL CLOSED. THE ROOM HAS THREE WINDOWS SHUT AND A BLIND CLOSET. HERE IS RUSTY WATER TO CLEAN ME WELL ENOUGH TO GIVE BACK TO PEOPLE.
I AM WHERE BONES FALL AFTER EATING. BEFORE YOU DIE I SEE YOUR BODY ON A BED IN THE LIGHT. YOUR SHIRT IS OPEN A SUITOR’S BOAST YOUR CHEST ADMITTING DEVOTION. I HAD NOT EXPECTED A CLAIM FROM A DYING MAN.
YOU SURPRISE ME DEAD BEFORE I AM.
WHEN YOU COME ALONG BY NIGHT TO WATCH MY OWN GIRL I LOVE HER MORE AND SEND YOU HOME.
Jenny Holzer is a Conceptual artist best known for her text-based public art projects. Holzer's work speaks of violence, oppression, sexuality, feminism, power, war and death. Throughout the years, Holzer has employed a variety of media, from a T-shirt to a plaque to an LED sign. Starting in the 1970s with the New York City posters, and continuing through her recent light projections on landscape and architecture, she uses her art as a form of communication and commentary. Holzer's art hangs in important collections around the globe including 7 World Trade Center, the Venice Biennale, the Guggenheim Museums in New York and Bilbao and the Whitney Museum of American Art.
2004 Electronic LED sign with blue diodes and anodized aluminium housing. 41.9 x 4.8 x 1.2 cm (16 1/2 x 1 7/8 x 1/2 in.) Signed in black felt-tip pen and numbered 4/20 (printed) on the label affixed to the reverse (there were also 5 artist's proofs), published by Edition Schellmann, Munich and New York.