Activities, exhibitions and projects

Image: In Mourning and In Rage, 1977, Los Angeles City Hall , Performance by Suzanne Lacy and Leslie Labowitz. Photo by Maria Karras.

There are at least three common denominators in Suzanne Lacy's (Wasco, United States, 1945) long artistic career: the weaving of networks, works participated by the audience or by specific collectives, and the collaboration with other artists and social and cultural agents. We are, therefore, dealing with a collaborative and participatory form of art, which has nurtured the production of networks from the decade of the 1970s of the 20th Century to the present, anticipating or, at least, laying the groundwork for the interconnected society we find ourselves in in the 21st Century. These are some of the reasons why this exhibition starts off with a work like Net Construction (1973).

There are also three notable main themes in this retrospective. In the first place, the theme of sexual violence against women, which we can witness in Three Weeks in May (1977), In Mourning and In Rage (1977), and De tu puño y letra (2014). On the other hand, we can find the theme of transformative feminism and its memory in International Dinner Party (1979), Dinner at Jane's (1993), and The Performing Archive (2007). Finally, there are a number of projects focused on elderly women: Inevitable Associations (1976), The Bag Lady (1977), and Whisper, the Waves, the Wind (1983).

But beyond these themes, another characteristic trait in the artist's career is research-based work which is materialised in large-scale performances that involve a significant number of people, as is the case in Cancer Notes (1991). Furthermore, another series of works subvert the art system: exhibitions in One Woman Shows (1975), the fetishism of the work of art in Travels with Mona (1977), and other potential museums in Skin of Memory (1991).

Suzanne Lacy is undoubtedly an American artist who takes a critical outlook of her environment, as we can see in two works on the subject of the United States and the working class: Alterations (1994) and Dad Lessons (2019), where she explores her Californian working class origins. As in a loop, at the end of the show we go back to the beginning of a long and fruitful career.