Eleanor Antin

(b. 1935 in The Bronx, NY, lives and works in San Diego, CA)

Eleanor Antin works in photography, video, film, installation, drawing, performance, and writing. A key figure of conceptual art movements of the 1970s, Antin's ground-breaking practice spans five decades and has covered themes surrounding identity, gender, autobiography, class and social structures. Rearticulating historical narratives, both real and fictitious, she explores the tropes of feminist and conceptual art.

Roman Allegories, a series of large-scale, staged, and painterly photographs, depicts allegorical scenes from an imagined ancient Rome as Hollywoodesque versions of "orientalistic" romantic and neo-classical paintings by Nicolas Poussin, Jacques-Louis David and other 19th century French "Salon" paintings. The works are affectionate spoofs on classical culture with metaphorical parallels that point to the excesses of contemporary consumer economy, mixing theatrical backdrops and costumes with props from everyday life.

Over the last 50 years Antin has performed and exhibited her work internationally. She has been the subject of numerous major solo institutional exhibitions, including ICA, Boston, MA (2014); San Diego Art Museum, San Diego, CA (2008); Arnolfini, Bristol, UK and Mead Gallery, Warwick, UK (2001); Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, CA (1999) and. In 1975, her seminal exhibition 100 Boots was debuted at MoMA, New York, NY. Often as a performance artist, she has appeared in venues all around the world, including the Serpentine Gallery, London, UK (2017); The Brooklyn Museum (2012); Documenta 12, Kassel, Germany (2007); the 37th International Art Exhibition at the Venice Biennale, Italy (2005) and The Sydney Opera House, Australia (2002). She has received a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Woman's Caucus of the College Art Association, a Guggenheim Foundation Fellowship in 1997, and a Media Achievement Award from the National Foundation for Jewish Culture in 1998.

Her work is included in many important public collections such as the Tate Modern; Art Institute of Chicago; Whitney Museum; Museum of Modern Art (MoMA); The Jewish Museum; San Francisco Museum of Modern Art; Art Institute of Chicago; Centre Pompidou Paris; Museion, Museum of Contemporary Art of Bolzano; Sammlung Verbund Collection, Vienna, amongst others.