jenny holzer shows luminous artworks sculpted from divisive trump tweets at hauser & wirth

standing side by side at hauser & wirth west hollywood, two vertical robotic LEDs will showcase AI-generated texts prompted by jenny holzer.

kat barandy August 31, 2023 4 min

opening this week at hauser & wirth west hollywood

On September 1st, American artist Jenny Holzer will unveil her latest exhibition at Hauser & Wirth’s West Hollywood gallery, a location which opened earlier this year in time for Frieze 2023. This much-anticipated event marks her first major solo show in Los Angeles since 2012 and a groundbreaking exploration into the realm of artificial intelligence (AI) within her LED and text-based artistry. Holzer’s unique ability to encapsulate four decades of the American experience, particularly its evolution into the Information Age and the rise of AI, has consistently propelled her to the forefront of contemporary art. With this new collection, she will again redefine the boundaries of art and language.

jenny holzer hauser wirth
installation view, ‘READY FOR YOU WHEN YOU ARE Jenny Holzer,’ Hauser & Wirth West Hollywood
image by Collin LaFleche © 2023 Jenny Holzer, ARS

jenny holzer explores the world of AI

A highlight of the Hauser & Wirth West Hollywood exhibition will be a series of new works by Jenny Holzer. Among these, two vertical robotic LEDs will stand side by side, showcasing AI-generated texts. Representing a significant evolution in her long-standing investigation of language, both original and borrowed, the artist‘s engagement with AI delves into questions of authorship in the era of rapidly advancing technology. In ‘GOOD’ (2023), AI-generated descriptions of rapturous experiences will gracefully ascend along the LED in pastel hues. Conversely, ‘BAD’ (2023) will feature texts inspired by extremist political content, pulsating in shades of gray and red. Through these LED columns, Holzer captures the nuanced dialogue between human and artificial experiences, embracing both the harmonious and the chaotic.

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installation view, ‘READY FOR YOU WHEN YOU ARE Jenny Holzer,’ Hauser & Wirth West Hollywood
image by Collin LaFleche © 2023 Jenny Holzer, ARS

harnessing political division for art’s sake

Featured in the exhibition is ‘WTF’ (2022), a kinetic LED beam artwork that comprises tweets shared by Donald Trump during his single term as president, alongside posts by Q, the anonymous online poster who sparked the radical QAnon conspiracy movement. ‘WTF’ gracefully traverses a rail with an unpredictable rhythm, mirroring the erratic cadence of these messages’ initial online emergence. Its flashing and scrolling text cast a luminous glow on a collection of almost 300 ‘curse tablets’ strewn across the floor. Drawing inspiration from the curse tablets of ancient Greco-Roman times — inscribed with desires for retribution and hexes upon adversaries — Holzer’s modern tablets feature Trump’s tweets, resonating with the suspended LED display overhead.

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installation view, ‘READY FOR YOU WHEN YOU ARE Jenny Holzer,’ Hauser & Wirth West Hollywood
image by Collin LaFleche © 2023 Jenny Holzer, ARS

Crafted by impressing the tweets onto cast metal, then meticulously distressing and aging the pieces through folding, crumpling, piercing, and chemical treatments, these tablets stand as deformed or molten variations of the artist’s prior interpretations of public plaques. This deliberate disfigurement evokes notions of refuse, wreckage, and devastation. Together, these art pieces form ‘a capsule of the recent past while signaling the possible near future.’ They both document and mirror the exaggerated, furious rhetoric that defines today’s political and media climate.

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installation view, ‘READY FOR YOU WHEN YOU ARE Jenny Holzer,’ Hauser & Wirth West Hollywood
image by Collin LaFleche © 2023 Jenny Holzer, ARS

Adorning the gallery walls are Holzer’s latest additions from her ongoing series of Redaction Paintings. Rooted in her extensive research into declassified governmental documents, these artworks incorporate her meticulous process. She transfers excerpts from these sources onto linen manually, meticulously layering their contents and the redacted portions with oil paint and metal leaf. The compositions encompass references from FBI records concerning the Patriot Act, briefs from the Trump era, and a 2021 report from the US National Security Commission on Artificial Intelligence, which examines the rapid progression of AI technology.

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installation view, ‘READY FOR YOU WHEN YOU ARE Jenny Holzer,’ Hauser & Wirth West Hollywood
image by Collin LaFleche © 2023 Jenny Holzer, ARS