Jo
Artist
Catherine Opie
(American, born 1961)
Date1993
MediumChromogenic print
Dimensionssheet: 50.8 × 40.6 cm (20 × 16 in.)
framed: 54.1 × 43.3 cm (21 5/16 × 17 1/16 in.)
framed: 54.1 × 43.3 cm (21 5/16 × 17 1/16 in.)
ClassificationsPhotographs
Credit LineAlexander and Caroline DeWitt Fund
Object number2002.36
Label TextIdeas about community and gender stereotyping have been constant themes in Catherine Opie’s work. Jo is from the series, Portraits (1993-96), documenting friends from American “subcultures”—lesbians, transsexuals, the S&M community. Although Opie controls everything about her subjects in the studio (pose, lighting, framing), she says she believes “there is something that they see within themselves that I end up capturing.” The elaborately tattooed and pierced Jo becomes, through Opie’s eyes, “very royal…I try to present people with an extreme amount of dignity. I mean, they are always going to be stared at, but I try and make the portraits stare back.”
ProvenanceAcquired from Gorney Bravin and Lee Gallery, New YorkOn View
Not on view
