Barbara Kruger

Skarstedt Gallery, New York
Acquired by the present owner from the above

New York, Skarstedt Gallery, Barbara Kruger: Pre-digital 1980 - 1992, March - April 2009, cat. no. 10, illustrated

This work is in very good condition overall. The sheet is hinged on the reverse to the backing board at the top. All of the collage elements are well intact. There are minor, soft creases in the lower corners. There is very faint, unobtrusive adhesive residue evident in the upper 1/4 of the composition. Framed under Plexiglas.
In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective qualified opinion.
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Barbara Kruger’s My Face Is Your Fortune is brilliantly engaging, triumphant and versatile, with a message that is equally as relevant and immediate as its initial execution in 1982. Augmented by a background in designing posters and labels at Mademoiselle magazine, Kruger stunningly appropriates image and text to create a new, active narrative. Kruger’s groundbreaking works of the early 80s have inspired and challenged myriad schools of thought and can be found in texts on Conceptual Art, Post-Modernism, Semiotics, Feminism, and Media Studies. 

In a manner reminiscent of Jenny Holzer’s truisms, Cindy Sherman’s media personalities, and Richard Prince’s appropriations, Kruger challenges and manipulates the most familiar media images. Kruger juxtaposes an appropriated and familiar black and white photograph of the profile of a woman splashing water on her face, equally still in her gesture and expressive in her reaction. The signature font is emphasized with a large box that neatly crops and composes the action of the subject.

Kruger’s work questions the extent to which aesthetic practices appropriated from advertisement ideology can exist without becoming advertisements. Instead, Kruger very clearly takes the viewer’s subjective position and interpretation into account in the production of her work. By directly referencing the viewer with the deictic term “your,” Kruger appeals to a subjectivity that is constructed through active participation and thought process. The quotations and cultural codes imbedded in Kruger’s work “have to be ‘decoded’ or ‘interpreted’” and, in the process, “the decoder is as important as the encoder” (Alexander Alberro, "Picturing Relations: Images, Texts and Social Engagement in the Work of Barbara Kruger," in Barbara Kruger, New York, 2010). To this degree, Kruger’s iconic combination of image and text is equally challenging as it is accepting, in which the viewer will always have the last word.