Recognised as one of the most significant American artists of her generation, Jenny Holzer is currently showing at BALTIC Centre for Contemporary Art in Gateshead. The exhibition is her largest and most comprehensive in 15 years, and offers the North East of England a view of some of her most important sculptural and electronic LED installations, produced since 1994.

 

Following the strength of Tilting Planet, the 2009 exhibition featuring the work of another leading female American sculptural artist, Sarah Sze, it is great to see BALTIC putting on another brilliant show that not only makes equally great use of the space that they have down on the Gateshead quays, but that makes the effort to challenge the audience to interact and get to grips with various forms of new media. 

 

Holzer started working with text as art in the 1970's, using the intricacies and complexities of language and communication to build a portfolio of work that addresses issues of authorship and power. This exhibition of textual light installations and paintings based, for the most part, on U.S. Government documents addresses and challenges the subject of censorship and the relay of information. 

 

Stand in front of any one of the installations to experience flashing text, scrolling at various speeds, offering us snippets of information that are somewhat intentionally difficult to grasp on a whole. The politically charged statements reeling past us emulate the fast-paced delivery of information that we receive from sources such as the media on a daily basis making it scarily apparent just how difficult it is to take everything onboard, but just how quickly we accept the information that we are exposed to.

 

Regardless of your stance on the message of the show, a visit to see the exhibition is highly recommended. Far more than being simply a passive experience, you are quickly engulfed in a visually impressive and captivating light show that has been constructed across 2 floors of BALTIC's space (2 and half if we count the 5th floor viewing balcony).  

 

For more information visit BALTIC's website, www.balticmill.com. The exhibition will run until 16th May.

 

Purchase the catalogue: Jenny Holzer