I was thinking about making a film that was around education and deconstructing how public school education works. Cartoons were the one that would come to me immediately as a memory. And I realized, wow, I can't remove this white on black image. It still was there. So that stuck with me. The idea of coming from different directions has always been very interesting for me to create one thing. But artists are very selfish. We're very myopic. They want it our way and there's the wrong way.
Ben Luke talks to Gary Simmons about his influences—from musicians to writers, film-makers, and, of course, other artists—and the cultural experiences that have shaped his life and work. Simmons, born in New York in 1964 and based in Los Angeles, is a significant figure in a generation of politically engaged, artistically ambitious US artists that emerged in the early 1990s. Gary explores the complexities of race and class through media including drawings on chalkboards, sculpture, installation, architectural environments and painting. He draws on diverse references, including from pop culture like cartoons and sports, to create works that address systemic and enduring prejudice and the nature of memory. Gary’s language is deeply personal and informed by his own experiences but also calls on imagery with collective, if unstable, meanings.
Gary Simmons: Public Enemy, Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, 13 June-1 October, Pérez Art Museum Miami, 5 December-24 April 2024. Gary Simmons: This Must Be the Place, Hauser & Wirth, London, until 29 July.
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