Crowdfunding has become commonplace in the art world, but this is a first for New York’s Jewish Museum. In anticipation of its fall exhibition, “Take Me (I’m Yours),” the museum is hoping to raise $30,000 through a newly-launched Kickstarter campaign.
“Take Me (I’m Yours)” is the work of curator Hans Ulrich Obrist and artist Christian Boltanski, and was originally shown at London’s Serpentine Galleries in 1995. The Jewish Museum’s remounting of the show, which marks its first appearance in the US, expands the original roster of 12 artists to 43, including some from the original run.
The unusual show will allow visitors to touch all the artworks, and even bring them home, in a complete upending of typical museum practices, which tend to be strictly hands-off. To make it happen, the museum will have to produce no less than 400,000 pieces for the four-month run of the exhibition.
Lawrence Weiner, NAU EM I ART BILONG YUMI (The art of today belongs to us), 1988–2016. Exhibition view of “Take Me (I’m Yours)” at Monnaie de Paris, 2015. Artwork © Lawrence Weiner/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York; photograph by Marc Domage.
Participating artists include Uri Aran, Andrea Bowers, Andrea Fraser, General Sisters, Gilbert & George, Felix Gonzalez-Torres, Jonathan Horowitz, Alison Knowles, Daniel Joseph Martinez, Jonas Mekas, Yoko Ono, Rachel Rose, Martha Rosler, Tino Sehgal, Haim Steinbach, Amalia Ulman, Lawrence Weiner, and Boltanski himself.
On average, there will be 10,000 individual copies of the works made for each artist, who will contribute sculpture, works on paper, installation, and even digital media and performance art. Many pieces will be new and site-specific.
Carsten Höller, Pill Clock (blue and white pills), 2015. Courtesy of the Jewish Museum.
The exhibition is meant to encourage conversation about consumerism, the value of art, and the overall hierarchy of the art market. By challenging convention, the show suggests that there are paths that artists might take other than selling their work through a gallery. For visitors, though, it is more likely that their encounter with the work will simply be a mad grab for available art.
“Take Me (I’m Yours)” is on view at the Jewish Museum, 1109 5th Ave, September 16, 2016–February 5, 2017.