Sara Cwynar and Legacy Russell: In Conversation
Hosted by Remai Modern and recorded on May 5, 2021. Sara Cwynar in conversation with writer and curator Legacy Russell for a discussion of the culture and history of image-making, particularly as it relates to gender and technology. Cwynar shares clips from her work Red Film as well as images and videos from her current exhibition at Remai Modern, Source.
The talk aligns with the forthcoming monograph Glass Life, published by Aperture, which includes a text by Russell. A feminist-inflected investigation of colour and image-driven consumer culture, Glass Life brings together Cwynar’s multilayered portraits and stills from the films Soft Film (2016), Rose Gold (2017), and Red Film (2018).
Speaker Bios
Sara Cwynar (b. 1985, Vancouver) lives and works in Brooklyn, New York. Solo exhibitions of her work have been held at The Polygon Gallery, North Vancouver; Oakville Galleries, ON; The Aldrich Contemporary Art Museum, USA; Minneapolis Institute of Art, USA; MMK Museum für Moderne Kunst, Germany; and Foam Photography Museum, The Netherlands. Recent group exhibitions include Subjektiv (2017), Malmö Konsthall, Sweden; L’Image Volée (2016), Fondazione Prada, Italy; and Greater New York (2015), MoMA PS1, USA. Her work is held in the permanent collections of the Art Gallery of Ontario; The Museum of Modern Art, New York; the Guggenheim Museum, New York; Centre Pompidou, Paris; and San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. In 2017, she published her first book Kitsch Encyclopedia with Blonde Art Books, and her first monograph, Glass Life is scheduled to be published by Aperture in spring 2021. In 2020, Cwynar was recognized with a Sobey Art Award and the Shpilman International Prize for Excellence in Photography.
Legacy Russell is a curator and writer. Born and raised in New York City, she is the Associate Curator of Exhibitions at The Studio Museum in Harlem. Russell holds an MRes with Distinction in Art History from Goldsmiths, University of London with a focus in Visual Culture. Her academic, curatorial, and creative work focuses on gender, performance, digital selfdom, internet idolatry, and new media ritual. Russell’s written work, interviews, and essays have been published internationally. Curated exhibitions and projects include LEAN (2020) featuring Justin Allen, Jen Everett, Devin Kenny, Kalup Linzy, Rene Matić, Sadé Mica, and Leilah Weinraub for Performa’s Radical Broadcast; This Longing Vessel : Studio Museum Artists in Residence 2019-20 featuring E. Jane, Elliot Reed, and Naudline Pierre (2020); Projects: Garrett Bradley (2020) and Projects 110 : Michael Armitage (2019), organized with Thelma Golden and The Studio Museum in Harlem at MoMA; Dozie Kanu : Function (2019), Chloë Bass : Wayfinding (2019), and Radical Reading Room (2019) at The Studio Museum in Harlem. She is the recipient of the Thoma Foundation 2019 Arts Writing Award in Digital Art, a 2020 Rauschenberg Residency Fellow, and a recipient of the 2021 Creative Capital Award. Her first book Glitch Feminism: A Manifesto (2020) is published by Verso Books. Her second book, BLACK MEME, is forthcoming via Verso Books.