Catherine Opie

This comprehensive new exhibition catalogue, published to accompany the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum's major mid-career survey of Catherine Opie's work, is the first to gather all of the artist's key projects to date in a single volume. Opie is best known for her subtle but potent portraits of people from the queer communities of Los Angeles and San Francisco. In this definitive volume, each of Opie's series--among them Portraits, Freeways, Domestic, Icehouses and In and Around Home--is show more reproduced in full color plates alongside works that were not displayed in the exhibition, allowing for the most complete overview of this important Los Angeles artist's work to date. In addition, this volume features a lead essay by exhibition curator Jennifer Blessing, which surveys Opie's artistic career and its historical contexts; a series of interviews with the artist by Russell Ferguson, Chair of the Department of Art at UCLA; and a brief personal reflection by internationally renowned novelist Dorothy Allison, whose work explores many concerns similar to Opie's. It also includes introductory essays on each of the artist's series by Nat Trotman, Assistant Curator at the Guggenheim, as well as a newly researched, exhaustive exhibition history and bibliography, making it the primary source for future research on Opie's work.
Catherine Opie was born in Ohio in 1961 and is currently Professor of Photography at UCLA. Opie's work has been exhibited extensively throughout the United States, Europe and Japan. She has had solo exhibitions of her work at the Walker Art Center, Minneapolis; St. Louis Art Museum; Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago; and the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, among many others. show less

California Condors, Boris Karloff as Frankenstein, Japanese horror films and Gordon Matta-Clark are among the many influences that make up the world of Rodarte. In just five short years, Rodarte has upended the fashion scene, bringing Kate and Laura Mulleavy, the designers behind the company, to the forefront of contemporary design and visual culture. Kate and Laura, who live and work between downtown Los Angeles and Pasadena, California, have consistently brought their love of nature, film, show more art and science to bear upon their unconventional and exquisitely crafted collections. Burning, sanding, dyeing, knitting, twisting, staining and weaving are some of the many complex techniques that have entered into the Rodarte textural vocabulary. Kate and Laura's past collaborations have included artists, actors, musicians and writers such as Miranda July, Autumn de Wilde, Ryan McGinley, Ari Marcopoulos and Darren Aronofsky. Created in collaboration with two of the art world's most sought-after and acclaimed photographers, Catherine Opie and Alec Soth, this is the first publication to examine the world of Rodarte. For the occasion, each photographer has developed an entirely new body of work in collaboration with Kate and Laura Mulleavy, examining the many facets of Rodarte's creative spectrum.
Without any formal training in fashion, California-raised sisters Kate and Laura Mulleavy, working as Rodarte, have become the most celebrated American designers at work today. Celebrities such as Kirsten Dunst, Natalie Portman and Charlotte Gainsbourg have all expressed their admiration for the Mulleavys, and Michelle Obama wore Rodarte at the opening ceremony of the 121st IOC session at the Copenhagen Opera House. show less

Interview with John Waters