Cut Books | Moyra Davey
2014
21.5 x 15.5 inches
Edition of 20, 3 APs
ABOUT THE ARTWORK
For Moyra Davey, a photograph is a moment of perception equivalent to a diary entry or a letter; it is a missive, a transmission that travels across time and space from maker to receiver. In recent years, she has made this journey of transmission literal: she folds, secures, addresses, and stamps her photographs and sends them through the mail. They arrive bearing marks from tape, ink, abrasions—evidence of their passage. The receiver cuts, unfolds, and flattens these “mailers” (as she calls them). Cut Books is a classic Davey image: books on a windowsill with decorative bookends; light streams in from the window and illuminates their forms. The title refers to older volumes, which required the owner to cut the pages before delving in. They are specifically described in the photograph and yet somehow mysterious, their pages closed to us viewers. A voracious and careful reader, Davey’s reverence for these objects is apparent. The light she bathes them in stands in for the illumination and inspiration she herself has drawn from countless texts over the years.
ABOUT MOYRA DAVEY
Born 1958 in Toronto
Moyra Davey, who lives and works in New York, is one of her generation’s most celebrated artists. Early in her career she made documentary photographs of her family in friends. About twenty years ago she turned her eye toward the quiet, overlooked details of daily life. Her deep interest in reading and writing has informed a video practice in which personal narratives are woven together with the texts and lives of thinkers she admires. A graduate of the Whitney Independent Study Program, Davey is the recipient of numerous prizes, including the Paul de Hueck and Norman Walford Career Achievement Award, the Louis C. Tiffany Foundation Award, and numerous Canada Council grants. Davey presented a solo exhibition, “Nuns on Main,” at Gallery TPW in 1984.
Selected solo exhibitions: “Hemlock Forest,” Bergen Kunsthall, Bergen, Norway (2016); “Burn the Diaries,” MUMOK—Museum Moderner Kunst Stiftung Ludwig, Vienna, and Institute of Contemporary Art, Philadelphia (2014); “Ornament and Reproach,” Presentation House Gallery, Vancouver (2013); “Hangmen of England,” Tate Liverpool (2013); and “Speaker Receiver,” Kunsthall Basel, Basel, Switzerland (2010).
Selected group exhibitions: “The Grand Balcony,” La Biennale de Montreal (2016); “Territories and Fictions: Thinking a New Way of the World,” Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, Madrid (2016); “Photo-Poetics: An Anthology,” Deutsche Bank Kunsthalle, Berlin, and Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York (2015); “Tell it to my Heart: Collected by Julie Ault,” Museum für Gegenwartskunst, Basel, Culturgest, Lisbon, and Artists Space, New York (2013–14); “The Imminence of Poetics,” XXX Bienal de São Paulo (2012); “2012 Whitney Biennial,” Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; “New Photography 2011,” The Museum of Modern Art, New York.
Selected public collections: Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto; The Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago; The Museum of Modern Art, New York; The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; The Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; Tate Modern, London; Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofia, Madrid; Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles; The National Gallery of Art, Washington; National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa; San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, San Francisco; Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York.
2014
21.5 x 15.5 inches
Edition of 20, 3 APs
ABOUT THE ARTWORK
For Moyra Davey, a photograph is a moment of perception equivalent to a diary entry or a letter; it is a missive, a transmission that travels across time and space from maker to receiver. In recent years, she has made this journey of transmission literal: she folds, secures, addresses, and stamps her photographs and sends them through the mail. They arrive bearing marks from tape, ink, abrasions—evidence of their passage. The receiver cuts, unfolds, and flattens these “mailers” (as she calls them). Cut Books is a classic Davey image: books on a windowsill with decorative bookends; light streams in from the window and illuminates their forms. The title refers to older volumes, which required the owner to cut the pages before delving in. They are specifically described in the photograph and yet somehow mysterious, their pages closed to us viewers. A voracious and careful reader, Davey’s reverence for these objects is apparent. The light she bathes them in stands in for the illumination and inspiration she herself has drawn from countless texts over the years.
ABOUT MOYRA DAVEY
Born 1958 in Toronto
Moyra Davey, who lives and works in New York, is one of her generation’s most celebrated artists. Early in her career she made documentary photographs of her family in friends. About twenty years ago she turned her eye toward the quiet, overlooked details of daily life. Her deep interest in reading and writing has informed a video practice in which personal narratives are woven together with the texts and lives of thinkers she admires. A graduate of the Whitney Independent Study Program, Davey is the recipient of numerous prizes, including the Paul de Hueck and Norman Walford Career Achievement Award, the Louis C. Tiffany Foundation Award, and numerous Canada Council grants. Davey presented a solo exhibition, “Nuns on Main,” at Gallery TPW in 1984.
Selected solo exhibitions: “Hemlock Forest,” Bergen Kunsthall, Bergen, Norway (2016); “Burn the Diaries,” MUMOK—Museum Moderner Kunst Stiftung Ludwig, Vienna, and Institute of Contemporary Art, Philadelphia (2014); “Ornament and Reproach,” Presentation House Gallery, Vancouver (2013); “Hangmen of England,” Tate Liverpool (2013); and “Speaker Receiver,” Kunsthall Basel, Basel, Switzerland (2010).
Selected group exhibitions: “The Grand Balcony,” La Biennale de Montreal (2016); “Territories and Fictions: Thinking a New Way of the World,” Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, Madrid (2016); “Photo-Poetics: An Anthology,” Deutsche Bank Kunsthalle, Berlin, and Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York (2015); “Tell it to my Heart: Collected by Julie Ault,” Museum für Gegenwartskunst, Basel, Culturgest, Lisbon, and Artists Space, New York (2013–14); “The Imminence of Poetics,” XXX Bienal de São Paulo (2012); “2012 Whitney Biennial,” Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; “New Photography 2011,” The Museum of Modern Art, New York.
Selected public collections: Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto; The Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago; The Museum of Modern Art, New York; The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; The Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; Tate Modern, London; Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofia, Madrid; Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles; The National Gallery of Art, Washington; National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa; San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, San Francisco; Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York.
2014
21.5 x 15.5 inches
Edition of 20, 3 APs
ABOUT THE ARTWORK
For Moyra Davey, a photograph is a moment of perception equivalent to a diary entry or a letter; it is a missive, a transmission that travels across time and space from maker to receiver. In recent years, she has made this journey of transmission literal: she folds, secures, addresses, and stamps her photographs and sends them through the mail. They arrive bearing marks from tape, ink, abrasions—evidence of their passage. The receiver cuts, unfolds, and flattens these “mailers” (as she calls them). Cut Books is a classic Davey image: books on a windowsill with decorative bookends; light streams in from the window and illuminates their forms. The title refers to older volumes, which required the owner to cut the pages before delving in. They are specifically described in the photograph and yet somehow mysterious, their pages closed to us viewers. A voracious and careful reader, Davey’s reverence for these objects is apparent. The light she bathes them in stands in for the illumination and inspiration she herself has drawn from countless texts over the years.
ABOUT MOYRA DAVEY
Born 1958 in Toronto
Moyra Davey, who lives and works in New York, is one of her generation’s most celebrated artists. Early in her career she made documentary photographs of her family in friends. About twenty years ago she turned her eye toward the quiet, overlooked details of daily life. Her deep interest in reading and writing has informed a video practice in which personal narratives are woven together with the texts and lives of thinkers she admires. A graduate of the Whitney Independent Study Program, Davey is the recipient of numerous prizes, including the Paul de Hueck and Norman Walford Career Achievement Award, the Louis C. Tiffany Foundation Award, and numerous Canada Council grants. Davey presented a solo exhibition, “Nuns on Main,” at Gallery TPW in 1984.
Selected solo exhibitions: “Hemlock Forest,” Bergen Kunsthall, Bergen, Norway (2016); “Burn the Diaries,” MUMOK—Museum Moderner Kunst Stiftung Ludwig, Vienna, and Institute of Contemporary Art, Philadelphia (2014); “Ornament and Reproach,” Presentation House Gallery, Vancouver (2013); “Hangmen of England,” Tate Liverpool (2013); and “Speaker Receiver,” Kunsthall Basel, Basel, Switzerland (2010).
Selected group exhibitions: “The Grand Balcony,” La Biennale de Montreal (2016); “Territories and Fictions: Thinking a New Way of the World,” Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, Madrid (2016); “Photo-Poetics: An Anthology,” Deutsche Bank Kunsthalle, Berlin, and Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York (2015); “Tell it to my Heart: Collected by Julie Ault,” Museum für Gegenwartskunst, Basel, Culturgest, Lisbon, and Artists Space, New York (2013–14); “The Imminence of Poetics,” XXX Bienal de São Paulo (2012); “2012 Whitney Biennial,” Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; “New Photography 2011,” The Museum of Modern Art, New York.
Selected public collections: Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto; The Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago; The Museum of Modern Art, New York; The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; The Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; Tate Modern, London; Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofia, Madrid; Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles; The National Gallery of Art, Washington; National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa; San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, San Francisco; Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York.