Semblances: Jennifer Danos, Natasha Pestich and Marcus Young

Encountering a semblance is to be unsure of what you are looking at.  A semblance of art has the potential to question the idea of art, the institution of the museum, and the act of viewership.  In their collaborative exhibition “Semblances,” Jennifer Danos, Natasha Pestich, and Marcus Young created a collection of site-sensitive artworks inspiring a closer examination of the consequences of museum authority, personal behavior in public spaces and display strategies within the narratives of art history.  For them, creating likenesses, inventing myths, and offering subjective experiences are strategies for questioning the aura of artworks and visitor expectations in art museums.

Danos created a “repeat experience” based on the layout and artworks in the exhibition in the adjacent contemporary prints gallery in order to reveal and accentuate the seemingly transparent displays that mediate art audience experiences; Pestich installed an exhibition of posters and other printed matter based on the tumultuous career of a fictional artist; Young created behavioral art—personal practices and collective experiences—to be learned and enacted throughout the museum by anyone interested, including the MIA staff, volunteers, and visitors.

Download the exhibition brochure of Semblances (pdf). Watch a video interview of Marcus Young here.

Generous support for the Minnesota Artists Exhibition Program is provided by The McKnight Foundation and Jerome Foundation.