Hugo Boss Prize 2006

An exhibition of the work of British artist Tacita Dean, winner of the HUGO BOSS PRIZE 2006, will be on view at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum from February 23 through June 6, 2007. Dean works with such diverse mediums as drawing, sound, and found objects, but she is perhaps best know for her compelling 16mm films, two of which will be featured in the Guggenheim exhibition, along with an examples of her found and photographic work.

The exhibition has been organized by Joan Young, Associate Curator of Contemporary Art, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, and includes four works: Kodak, Noir et Blanc, Found Obsolescence (all 2006), and Majesty (portrait) (2007), none of which have been previously exhibited in New York. The first three works highlight the medium of celluloid film, a format that is becoming increasingly scarce as it is replaced by digital alternatives. After discovering that the Kodak factory in Chalon-sur-Saône, France, was closing its film production facility, Dean obtained permission to document the manufacture of film at the factory with the soon-to-be obsolete medium itself. The resulting rear-screen projection Noir et Blanc, filmed on the final five rolls Dean acquired, turns the medium on itself.

The 44-minute-long work Kodak constitutes a meditative elegy for the approaching demise of a medium specific to Dean's own practice. Kodak's narrative follows the making of the celluloid as it runs through several miles of machinery. On the day of filming, the factory also ran a test through the system with brown paper, providing a rare opportunity to see the facilities fully illuminated, without the darkness needed to prevent exposure. Also on view is Found Obsolescence, a strip of unexposed 16mm negative that Dean found in the factory's sprocket machine, the holes abruptly stopping before its production was completed.

Throughout her oeuvre, Dean has drawn the viewer's attention to overlooked or unseen aspects of her subject. The fourth work on view, Majesty (portrait) (2007), is part of a series of painted photographs that Dean has created of trees in southeastern England. On a photograph of this noble oak tree, Dean has painted over the background with white pigment, removing any excess details and leaving the subject ever so more imposing in its solemnity.

In November 2006, Dean was selected as the HUGO BOSS PRIZE 2006 winner from a shortlist of finalists which included Jennifer Allora (U.S.) and Guillermo Calzadilla (Puerto Rico); John Bock (Germany); Damián Ortega (Mexico); Aïda Ruilova (U.S.); and Tino Sehgal (UK). Established in 1996, the biennial award was conceived to recognize and support significant achievement in contemporary art. Since its inception, the prize has evolved into one of the premier juried prizes of contemporary art.

The jury for HUGO BOSS PRIZE 2006 included Jennifer Blessing, Curator of Photography, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum; Silvia Karman Cubiñá, Director, The Moore Space, Miami; Massimiliano Gioni, Artistic Director, Fondazione Nicola Trussardi, Milan, and Curator, New Museum of Contemporary Art, New York; Vicente Todoli, Director, Tate Modern, London; and Maria-Christina Villaseñor, Associate Curator of Film and Media Art, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum.

In their statement, the HUGO BOSS PRIZE 2006 jury described their selection:

Tacita Dean's impressive body of work navigates the forgotten corners of history and experience through a range of films, photographs, drawings, and installations. While precise and rigorously formal in its exploration of the materiality of her chosen mediums, her work also demonstrates a sly, subtle wit, upending expectations and asking the viewer to rethink notions of spectacle, narrative development, and the reliability of narrators. In a number of pieces, Dean explores our culture of obsolescence-whether as a pre-planned commercial strategy, an act of historical rewriting, or as plain neglect.... It is Dean's refusal to let the past disappear, to stubbornly insist on its presence and trace in complex and compelling art works, that led us to award her the 2006 HUGO BOSS PRIZE. -- www.guggenheim.org