Dates
September 9 – December 7, 2021
TOURS BY APPOINTMENT ONLY / RESERVATIONS REQUIRED. To visit this exhibition you must make a reservation, linked above. Tours are limited to 15 people. You must have proof of vaccination or a negative test within 48 hours to attend. Please arrive 10 minutes before your appointment to allow for check-in. Please visit the TBA:21 COVID-19 FAQ and the Cooley website for more information.
ACCESSIBILITY
The Cooley Gallery is easily accessible from the Reed library lobby. Both the Cooley and the library possess all ADA accessibility accommodations.
No Face, No Case: Portraiture’s Breaking
Cooley Gallery, Reed College
Laura Aguilar, Nayland Blake, Georganne Deen, Omer Fast, Ann Hamilton, Jim Hodges, Y.Z. Kami, Mariko Mori, Yasumasa Morimura, Catherine Opie, Andres Serrano, Gary Simmons, and Nari Ward
Partner Program with Cooley Gallery, Reed College
Organized by the No Face, No Case Collective, a course of Reed College students and faculty, and Cooley director Stephanie Snyder.
DESCRIPTION
How do we relate to images of the self when the self is in a state of breakdown? This question is one of the concerns at the heart of the Cooley Gallery exhibition No Face, No Case: Portraiture’s Breaking. Composed of painting, photography, sculpture, and video, the project considers portraiture’s unstable, shifting status in the wake of the genre’s collapse as a site of power, capital, and representation. Made by a group of visionary artists from 1990–2005, the portraits in No Face, No Case incite a reconsideration and defamiliarization of the legibility and limits of the self. The exhibition also speaks to the current stream of digital “portraits” collected by police and the government for the purposes of surveilling and capturing individuals through the image of the face. No Face, No Case includes work by Laura Aguilar, Nayland Blake, Georganne Deen, Omer Fast, Ann Hamilton, Jim Hodges, Y.Z. Kami, Mariko Mori, Yasumasa Morimura, Catherine Opie, Andres Serrano, Gary Simmons, and Nari Ward. The works in the exhibition were donated to the Reed College Art Collection by the Peter Norton Collection.
ABOUT
The Douglas F. Cooley Memorial Art Gallery is Reed College’s intimate, academic museum, nestled in the Reed library. The Cooley's mission is to enrich the academic life of the college by organizing a diverse range of scholarly exhibitions, accompanied by publications and public programs. The gallery was established by a generous 1988 gift from Sue and Edward Cooley and John and Betty Gray, in honor of Douglas F. Cooley, who died tragically at a young age. The Cooley performs its work "in support of the teaching of art history at Reed College—part of an interdisciplinary educational experience that strengthens the art history component of Reed's distinctive humanities program.”
Stephanie Snyder has served as the Cooley’s director and curator since 2003. Exhibitions are organized by Snyder, often in dialogue or collaboration with Reed faculty and students (as well as museums and galleries around the country) with meaningful attention to the needs and interests of regional communities. The Cooley collaborates with museums, curators, and art historians from around the world, and has traveled its exhibitions to museums such as the Museum of Modern Art, PS1 (New York), and The New Museum (New York). A schedule of three to four exhibitions during the academic year allows the Cooley to exhibit work that would not otherwise be seen in the region.