Biography

Barbara Kruger
(Born 1945)

Barbara Kruger was born in Newark, New Jersey in 1945. She graduated from Parson’s School of Design in New York City in1966. She began solidifying her well-known style in the late 1970s. Her earlier career in graphic design and advertising as well as her interest in poetry heavily influenced her photograph and text based works–which took advantage of traditional iconography and slogans to make incisive commentary against pervading social stereotypes and consumerist culture. Through her works, Kruger explored these themes and the powerful role that mass-media images play in the perpetuation and establishment of certain social notions, especially in regards to women. When overlapped in Kruger’s works, previously unrelated images and slogans take on new dimension and meaning. They transmit a surprisingly different tone than the one generally present in mainstream media, and question issues of consumerism, feminine sexuality, desire and individuality. Kruger’s intense compositions, usually in a limited palette of black, white and red, have been displayed in multiple mediums that include posters, electronic signboards, billboards and unframed photographs.

Barbara Kruger has exhibited extensively throughout the United States and Europe. Recent solo exhibitions of her work have been held in institutions such as the Moderna Museet in Stockholm in 2008, the Museum of Contemporary Art in San Diego, California in 2005, and the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York in 2000. She has also participated in exhibitions in major institutions such as the Centre Pompidou in Paris, the Metropolitan Muesum of Art in New York, and the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles, California. Kruger has participated in several Whitney Biennials, and her work has been featured in multiple publications. Barbara Kruger lives in New York and Los Angeles.

SELECTED SOLO EXHIBITIONS
2011
L & M Arts Los Angeles, Venice, California.
The Globe Shrinks, Sprüth Magers, Berlin, Germany.
2010
Plenty, Guild Hall Museum, East Hampton, New York.
The Globe Shrinks, Mary Boone Gallery, New York.
2009
Sprüth Magers, London, England.
Between Being Born and Dying, Lever House, New York.
Barbara Kruger: Pre-digital 1980-1992, Skarstedt Gallery, New York
2008
Moderna Museet, Stockholm, Sweden.
2007
’Picture/Readings’ 1978, Mary Boone Gallery, New York
2006
Kestnergesellschaft, Hannover, Germany.
2005
Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego, San Diego, California.
Australian Center for Contemporary Art, Melbourne, Australia.
Tramway, Glasgow, Scotland.
Gallery of Modern Art, Glasgow, Scotland.
2004
Mary Boone Gallery, New York
Twelve, Mary Boone Gallery, New York
2003
Sprüth Magers Lee, London, England.
2002
Palazzo delle Papesse - Centro Arte Contemporanea, Siena, Italy.
2001
South London Gallery, London, England.
2000
Whitney Museum of American Art, New York
1999
Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, California.
Galerie Yvon Lambert, Paris, France.
1998
Parrish Art Museum, Southampton, New York.
1997
18 Wooster Street/Deitch Projects, New York
Mary Boone Gallery, New York
1996
Museum of Modern Art at Heide, Melbourne, Australia.
1994
Mary Boone Gallery, New York
1992
Magasin, Centre National d'Art Contemporain, Grenoble, France.
1991
Mary Boone Gallery, New York
1990
Kolnischer Kunstverein, Koln, Germany.
Duke University Museum of Art, Durham, North Carolina.
1989
Mary Boone Gallery, New York
1988
National Art Gallery, Wellington, New Zealand.
1987
Mary Boone Gallery, New York
1986
Krannert Art Museum, University of Illinois, Champaign, Illinois.
University Art Museum, University of California, Berkeley, California.
1985
Contemporary Arts Museum, Houston, Texas.
Wadsworth Atheneum, Hartford, Connecticut.
Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, California.
1984
Crousel/Hussenot Galerie, Paris, France.
Nouveau Musee, Lyon, France.
Kunsthalle Basel, Basel, Switzerland.
1983
Institute of Contemporary Art, London, England.
1980
P.S. 1, Long Island City, New York.

SELECTED GROUP SHOWS
2011
That’s The Way We Do It. The Techniques and Aesthetic of Appropriation, Kunsthaus Bregenz, Bregenz, Austria.
Unsettled: Photography and Politics in Contemporary Art, Philadelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
No Substitute, Glenstone, Potomac, Maryland.
The Deconstructive Impulse: Women Artists Reconfigure the Signs of Power, 1973-1992, Nasher Museum of Art at Duke University, Durham, North Carolina.
The Deconstructive Impulse: Women Artists Reconfigure the Signs of Power, 1973-1992, Neuberger Museum of Art, Purchase College, State University of New York, Purchase, New York.
2010
America: Now and Here, cross-country traveling exhibition.
Pictures by Women: A History of Modern Photography, The Museum of Modern Art, NYC, NY.
PQ: 100, The Center for Photography at Woodstock, Woodstock, New York.
Your History is Not Our History, Haunch of Venison, NYC, NY.
In the Vernacular, The Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois.
2009
Beg Borrow and Steal, Rubell Family Collection, Miami, Florida.
Collection: MOCA’s First Thirty Years, The Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, California.
Dress Codes: The Third ICP Triennial of Photography and Video, International Center of Photography, NYC, NY.
Strait-Jacket, Ydessa Hendeles Art Foundation, Toronto, Canada.
elles@centrepompidou, Musée national d’art moderne, Centre Pompidou, Paris, France.
A Tribute to Ron Warren, Mary Boone Gallery, NYC, NY.
WALL ROCKETS: Contemporary Artists and Ed Ruscha, Albright- Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, New York.
The Pictures Generation, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, NYC, NY.
Silent Writings, Espace Louis Vuitton, Paris, France.
You will never wake up from this beautiful dream, Vanmoerkerke Collection, Oostende, Belgium.
2008
Burning Down the House: Building a Feminist Art Collection, Elizabeth A. Sackler Center for Feminist Art, Brooklyn Museum, Brooklyn, New York.
WALL ROCKETS: Contemporary Artists and Ed Ruscha, FLAG Art Foundation, NYC, NY.
People ‘Weekly’, The Amie and Tony James Gallery, The Graduate Center, The City University of New York, NYC, NY.
Book/Shelf, Museum of Modern Art, NYC, NY.
Here and Now, Regina Gallery, Moscow, Russia.
Ringling Retro: Modern and Contemporary Art, The Ringling Museum of Art, Sarasota, Florida.
Women in the City, a West of Rome project, Los Angeles, California.
2007
Multiplex: Directions in Art, 1970 to Now, The Museum of Modern Art, NYC, NY.
Panic Attack! Art in the Punk Years, Barbican Art Gallery, London, England.
Dangerous Beauty, Chelsea Art Museum, NYC, NY.
2006
Belief, Singapore Biennial, Singapore.
New York, New York: Fifty Years of Art, Architecture, Photography, Film and Video, Grimaldi Forum, Monaco.
Full House: Views of the Whitney's Collection at 75, Whitney Museum of American Art, NYC, NY.
Where Are We Going? Selections from the François Pinault Collection, Palazzo Grassi, Venice, Italy.
A Short History of Performance – Part IV, Whitechapel Art Gallery, London, England.
2005
Miradas y Conceptos en la Collección Helga de Alvear, Museo Extremeño e Iberoamericano de Arte Contemporáneo, Badajoz, Spain.
American Matrix: Contemporary Directions for the Harn Museum Collection, Samuel P. Harn Museum of Art, University of Florida, Gainesville, Florida.
The Experience of Art, Italian Pavilion, La 51 Biennale di Venezia, Venice, Italy.
Inside Out Loud: Visualizing Women's Health in Contemporary Art, Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum, Washington University in Saint Louis, Saint Louis, Missouri.
2004
White: Whiteness and Race in Contemporary Art, International Center of Photography, NYC, NY.
Perspectives @25: A Quarter Century of New Art in Houston, Contemporary Arts Museum, Houston, Texas.
North Fork/South Fork: East End Art Now/Part II, Parrish Art Museum, Southampton, New York.
Flowers, Mary Boone Gallery, NYC, NY.
2003
Me & More, Kunstmuseum Luzern, Lucerne, Switzerland.
2002
Shopping, Schirn Kunsthalle, Frankfurt, Germany.
Sans Commune Mesure, Musee des Beaux-Arts, Lille, France.
2000
Around 1984: A Look at Art in the Eighties, P.S. 1 Contemporary Art Center, Long Island City, New York.
1999
The American Century: Art and Culture 1950-2000, Whitney Museum of American Art, NYC, NY.
1998
Read My Lips: Jenny Holzer, Barbara Kruger, Cindy Sherman, National Gallery of Australia, Canberra, Australia.
1996
Thinking Print: Books to Billboards, 1980-95, The Museum of Modern Art, NYC, NY.
1995
Passions Privees, Musee d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris, Paris, France.
1994
Wall to Wall, Serpentine Gallery, London, England.
1993
Image Makers, Nassau County Museum of Art, Roslyn Harbor, New York.
1992
More Than One Photography: Works Since 1980 From the Collection, The Museum of Modern Art, NYC, NY.
1991
Devil on the Stairs: Looking Back on the Eighties, Institute of Contemporary Art, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
1990
Art et Publicite, Musee National d'Art Moderne, Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris, France.
The Decade Show, Museum of Contemporary Hispanic Art/The New Museum of Contemporary Art/The Studio Museum in Harlem, NYC, NY.
1989
Image World: Art and Media Culture, Whitney Museum of American Art, NYC, NY.
Magiciens de la Terre, Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris, France.
A Forest of Signs: Art in the Crisis of Representation, The Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, California.
Bilderstreit, Rheinhalle, Koln, West Germany.
1988
Biennial of Sydney, Sydney, Australia.
1987
Documenta 8, Museum Fridericianum, Kassel, West Germany.
L'epoque, la mode, la morale, la passion, Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris, France.
1987
Biennial Exhibition, Whitney Museum of American Art, NYC, NY.
1986
Barbara Kruger and Jenny Holzer, The Israel Museum, Jerusalem, Israel.
An American Renaissance: Painting and Sculpture from 1940 to the Present, Museum of Art, Fort Lauderdale, Florida.
Painting and Sculpture Today: 1986, Indianapolis Museum of Art, Indianapolis, Indiana.
1985
Biennial Exhibition, Whitney Museum of American Art, NYC, NY.
1984
Sexuality and Representation, Institute of Contemporary Art, London, England.
1983
Times Square Spectochrome Sign, NYC, NY.
1983 Biennial Exhibition, Whitney Museum of American Art, NYC, NY.
Currents, Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston, Massachusetts.
1982
Image Scavengers, Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston, Massachusetts.
La Biennale di Venezia, Venice, Italy.
Documenta 7, Museum Fridericianum, Kassel, West Germany.
1981
Nineteen Emerging Artists, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, NYC, NY.

PUBLIC PROJECTS
2011
Untitled (Be here now), Op Ed page, THE NEW YORK TIMES, 5 June 2011, p. WK8.
2010
Circus, site-specific installation for the Rotunda, Schirn Kunsthalle, Frankfurt, Germany.
Cover, W MAGAZINE, The Art Issue, November 2010.
Whitney on Site: New Commissions Downtown, outdoor installation at the future site of The Whitney Museum of American Art, Gansevoort and Washington Streets, NYC, NY.
Untitled (It), Façade installation for the Art Gallery of Ontario, Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto, Canada.
Map for the London Tube, London Underground stations, London, England.
2008
Cover, NEW YORK MAGAZINE, 24 March 2008.
Another, Price Center, wall installation at The Stuart Collection at the University of California, San Diego, San Diego, California.
Untitled (Shafted), installation at the Broad Contemporary Art Museum at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, California.
Video billboards for Women in the City, a West of Rome project, Los Angeles, California.
2006
Exhibition design and graphic identity for Consider This… exhibition at Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, California.
2004
Cover, ART US, January-February 2004.
2003
Façade banners, subway posters, billboards and bus wraps for Selfridges Department Stores, London, Manchester, Birmingham, England.
2002
Kuahof department store façade banners, Frankfurt, Germany.
2000
Banner billboards at Eighth Avenue/42 Street and Washington Street/West Side Highway, co-produced by the Public Art Fund and the Whitney Museum of American Art, NYC, NY, July 2000.
1997
New York City/Queens Transit Line bus wrap, Public Art Fund, NYC, NY, November 1997.
1995
Design for outdoor theater, North Carolina Museum of Art, Raleigh, North Carolina (collaboration with Smith-Miller & Hawkinson and Nicholas Quennell).
1994
Design for train station, Strasbourg, France.
Editorial feature, HARPER'S BAZAAR, February 1994.
1993
Billboards, products and radio spots, Women's Work Project on Domestic Violence, Liz Claiborne, Inc., Boston, Massachusetts and Miami, Florida.
1992
Billboards and bus shelters, Women's Work Project on Domestic Violence, Liz Claiborne, Inc., San Francisco, California.
Billboard, bus shelter and bus placard project, Portland Art Museum, Portland,
Oregon.
Cover and editorial spread, NEWSWEEK, 8 June 1992.
Cover and essay, ESQUIRE, May 1992.
Poster project, Magasin, Centre National d'Art Contemporain, Grenoble, France.
1991
Billboard project, Von-der-Heydt-Museum, Wuppertal-Elberfeld, Germany.
Bus shelter posters, Public Art Fund, NYC, NY.
1990
Exterior wall project, Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, California.
1989
Billboard project, Public Art Fund, Manhattan and Queens, New York.
1988
Picturing Greatness, exhibition curated and designed for The Museum of Modern Art, NYC, NY.
1986
Billboard project, Art Angel, London, England.