Bagit!

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postcard book

Introduction by

Anthony Haden-Guest "The shopping bag pieces in Matuschka's series are artful in every sense of that slippery word. The materials she uses in Bagit! are just that, empty shopping bags, but she has plucked them from the worlds of shopping, branding and packaging and turned them to her own ends..."

Hard Press Editions

a print and

bagit!

bagit!

bagit! a print and

Introduction by

Anthony Haden-Guest

postcard book

matuschka

MATUSCHKA

matuschka

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Bag It Design0209:Postcard Page 2/28/09 8:04 PM Page 2

Bagism Anthony Hadden-Guest

The shopping bag pieces in Matuschka’s series are artful in every sense of that slippery word. The materials she uses in Bagit! are just that, empty shopping bags, but she has plucked them from the worlds of shopping, branding, and packaging and turned them to her own ends.

Which pack a whammy.

At first, the viewer may feel that he or she is drifting through the familiar world of pure abstraction, but then elements of the real tug at the attention. Yes, that IS a blue but it is also Tiffany’s trademarked blue and these white coils like albino serpents are the cords—so that the sweetness is cut, leaving a seductively bittersweet aftertaste.

The shopping experience has an archaeology, a history and, necessarily, a literature. “We have been a’shopping,” declared the heroine of Fanny Burney’s 1778 novel, Evelina, freshly arrived in London-town. The word

was then a fairly new coinage and devoid of the complex cultural concerns with consumption, branding, and, marketing that characterize our present day.

Now shopping has acquired an art context too. Matuschka is not alone in this fertile zone—hello, Haim Steinbach, Sylvie Fleurie—but she is subtle and acid. The sex appeal of luxury products and brand name obsession is based on the gospel of consumerism: “I am what I buy.”

Shopping bags are the eye-catching carriers of this message to the world; colorful containers of secret codes and signals that speak their own language—or as Matuschka puts it: “You are what you bag.”

So a few thoughts about the artist before we focus on the art.

Writers do not ordinarily concern themselves overmuch with the biographical data of an artist with whose work they are dealing, and rightly so. What do we feel that we need to know about the upbringing, private life, or politi-

cal actions or inaction of Matisse? Cindy Sherman?

Damien Hirst?

There are artists, though, who do create precisely a desire to know such stuff because there is something about their work that gives the impression of clearly referencing their lives, and lives lived with some intensity.

Some of Picasso’s oeuvre makes him the Grand Panjandrum of such artists but others come to mind: Malcolm Morley, Frida Kahlo, Hannah Wilke. Matuschka is of their number.

From an early runaway juvenile delinquent to a high fashion runway model to a role model for a serious disease— we can glean an imperfection of the life, a perfection of the work. This background is, I think, more relevant than it may immediately sound. History, including art history, normally confines itself to the “What happened.” And “What happened next?” It usually avoids the “What if things had been different?” But Matuschka’s history of experience, and her sheer capacity to recuperate from it,

are very much part of her art. At a fraction of an inch under 6 feet she became known for using her body to create art which often mixes beauty with death, disaster, and disease.

In the 1980s and 1990s she created a haunting world, using her own photographs, either nudes of herself, body casts or, in one case, herself plus the upper half of a mannequin—images that brood upon appearances while suggesting psychological extremes.

Matuschka’s work then may have been self-absorbed, but her self-absorption had nothing to do with either narcissism or the reverse narcissism of self-loathing. She happens to be her own raw material.

And she looks at her raw material objectively and manipulates it unflinchingly in a way which now seem uncannily predictive.

For instance, in 1991 Matuschka was diagnosed with breast cancer and in 1993 she became the first “topless”

cover girl in history when she appeared in profile, white turbaned, as if a surgeon rather than a patient, greyhound-lean, with her breastless right side bared, on the cover of the New York Times Sunday Magazine. She titled this self portrait (appropriately) “Beauty Out of Damage” and in 1994 was nominated for the Pulitzer.

Ten years later, “Beauty Out of Damage” was included in Life’s special tribute: “100 Photographs That Changed The World Since the Camera Was Invented.”

Matuschka’s work in the 90s undoubtedly had a decisive and enormous impact on public awareness of breast cancer and she found an effective way to put her altered figure to use. After her “Beauty Out of Damage” series she created a new body of work based on androgyny and the effects of globalization in an image driven/consumer based society. In such photographs she would pose herself, very deliberately in the frontal, hard-edged manner of Avedon or Penn.

The portraiture of these two studio maestros, though,

however stylized, was intended to suggest the capture of some underlying psychological truth. Indeed, in Avedon’s case, as when he put off taking his picture until his subject’s studied expression was replaced by something more “real,” indeed sometimes a hint of desperation; the truth could be a brutal one. Matuschka’s self-portraiture was very different, being all about role-playing for a satirical purpose, poking fun at labels and logos.

In 2006, her focus changed when she returned to a passion for recycling found objects—in this case, colorful ropes and paper bags. The shopping bag pieces in Bagit! mark a full stop for the artist and provides a throw back to the abstract work she created in the 70s and post 2000. Some of the artwork that Matuschka has derived and applied to these bags was created in the mid-70s when she was a student of Jennifer Bartlett’s at New York’s School of Visual Arts. The notion of art as a “commodity” was much in the art world air at the time. There were serious attempts to subvert the oh-so-despicable

Bagism Anthony Hadden-Guest

The shopping bag pieces in Matuschka’s series are artful in every sense of that slippery word. The materials she uses in Bagit! are just that, empty shopping bags, but she has plucked them from the worlds of shopping, branding, and packaging and turned them to her own ends.

Which pack a whammy.

At first, the viewer may feel that he or she is drifting through the familiar world of pure abstraction, but then elements of the real tug at the attention. Yes, that IS a blue but it is also Tiffany’s trademarked blue and these white coils like albino serpents are the cords—so that the sweetness is cut, leaving a seductively bittersweet aftertaste.

The shopping experience has an archaeology, a history and, necessarily, a literature. “We have been a’shopping,” declared the heroine of Fanny Burney’s 1778 novel, Evelina, freshly arrived in London-town. The word

was then a fairly new coinage and devoid of the complex cultural concerns with consumption, branding, and, marketing that characterize our present day.

Now shopping has acquired an art context too. Matuschka is not alone in this fertile zone—hello, Haim Steinbach, Sylvie Fleurie—but she is subtle and acid. The sex appeal of luxury products and brand name obsession is based on the gospel of consumerism: “I am what I buy.”

Shopping bags are the eye-catching carriers of this message to the world; colorful containers of secret codes and signals that speak their own language—or as Matuschka puts it: “You are what you bag.”

So a few thoughts about the artist before we focus on the art.

Writers do not ordinarily concern themselves overmuch with the biographical data of an artist with whose work they are dealing, and rightly so. What do we feel that we need to know about the upbringing, private life, or politi-

cal actions or inaction of Matisse? Cindy Sherman?

Damien Hirst?

There are artists, though, who do create precisely a desire to know such stuff because there is something about their work that gives the impression of clearly referencing their lives, and lives lived with some intensity.

Some of Picasso’s oeuvre makes him the Grand Panjandrum of such artists but others come to mind: Malcolm Morley, Frida Kahlo, Hannah Wilke. Matuschka is of their number.

From an early runaway juvenile delinquent to a high fashion runway model to a role model for a serious disease— we can glean an imperfection of the life, a perfection of the work. This background is, I think, more relevant than it may immediately sound. History, including art history, normally confines itself to the “What happened.” And “What happened next?” It usually avoids the “What if things had been different?” But Matuschka’s history of experience, and her sheer capacity to recuperate from it,

are very much part of her art. At a fraction of an inch under 6 feet she became known for using her body to create art which often mixes beauty with death, disaster, and disease.

In the 1980s and 1990s she created a haunting world, using her own photographs, either nudes of herself, body casts or, in one case, herself plus the upper half of a mannequin—images that brood upon appearances while suggesting psychological extremes.

Matuschka’s work then may have been self-absorbed, but her self-absorption had nothing to do with either narcissism or the reverse narcissism of self-loathing. She happens to be her own raw material.

And she looks at her raw material objectively and manipulates it unflinchingly in a way which now seem uncannily predictive.

For instance, in 1991 Matuschka was diagnosed with breast cancer and in 1993 she became the first “topless”

cover girl in history when she appeared in profile, white turbaned, as if a surgeon rather than a patient, greyhound-lean, with her breastless right side bared, on the cover of the New York Times Sunday Magazine. She titled this self portrait (appropriately) “Beauty Out of Damage” and in 1994 was nominated for the Pulitzer.

Ten years later, “Beauty Out of Damage” was included in Life’s special tribute: “100 Photographs That Changed The World Since the Camera Was Invented.”

Matuschka’s work in the 90s undoubtedly had a decisive and enormous impact on public awareness of breast cancer and she found an effective way to put her altered figure to use. After her “Beauty Out of Damage” series she created a new body of work based on androgyny and the effects of globalization in an image driven/consumer based society. In such photographs she would pose herself, very deliberately in the frontal, hard-edged manner of Avedon or Penn.

The portraiture of these two studio maestros, though,

however stylized, was intended to suggest the capture of some underlying psychological truth. Indeed, in Avedon’s case, as when he put off taking his picture until his subject’s studied expression was replaced by something more “real,” indeed sometimes a hint of desperation; the truth could be a brutal one. Matuschka’s self-portraiture was very different, being all about role-playing for a satirical purpose, poking fun at labels and logos.

In 2006, her focus changed when she returned to a passion for recycling found objects—in this case, colorful ropes and paper bags. The shopping bag pieces in Bagit! mark a full stop for the artist and provides a throw back to the abstract work she created in the 70s and post 2000. Some of the artwork that Matuschka has derived and applied to these bags was created in the mid-70s when she was a student of Jennifer Bartlett’s at New York’s School of Visual Arts. The notion of art as a “commodity” was much in the art world air at the time. There were serious attempts to subvert the oh-so-despicable

Bag It Design0209:Postcard Page 2/28/09 8:04 PM Page 6

processes of the commodification of art. (These efforts were not helped by being written in a jargon that usually read as if inadequately translated from a Teutonic dialect.)

And they failed too, of course.

The history of art is a history of human abilities suborned to promoting faith, or power, or lunatic reason, or monstrous bourgeois egos. Compared to such, shopping used to be at least comparatively harmles Note the past tense here. Green grows the art world, oh.[HUH?] I think Matuschka’s shopping bags may be simply telling us to bag it.

“Serious” Matuschka, the artist on the barricades, is temporarily confined to the archives. The Matuschka of Bagit! is not frivolous—there’s nothing frivolous about the impact of Consu-merism—but in these pieces she

has taken the world off her shoulders.

Her touch is deft. She neither surrenders to her material, nor smothers it. She also teases a great of variety out of it, from the Rococo Minimalism of “Orange Sorbet” to the lively hominid that bounces across the J. Crew piece to the appropriately rayonniste mini-explosions on “Circle in the Square” to the scratchy, somewhat pubic look she gets—at least equally appropriately—from Victoria’s Secret and the “Pink Pussy Explosion.” Her play on “the bag” is casual and, at times, at odds with the sensuality and noose-like appearance of the rope that seems to dance effortlessly across these pages as she ironically pokes fun at consumers obsessed with branding.

The artist of Bagit! is a girl who, at least for the now, just wants to have fun.

Art: © Matuschka 2007 Introduction by Anthony Haden-Guest © 2007 Photo Credits: Tim Aanensen @ 2007 Quark Layout: Catherine Sandler Digital input: Walt Mendelson Published by Hard Press Editions, Lenox Mass Printed in China ISBN 978-1-88097-7-2-5 Dedicated to Chris Gagliardi & Mini Max-areeno Bambino Special thanks to: John Ravet Thomas Halaczinsky Lynn Dunham Jonathon Gams Additional gratitude goes to Chris Dodin and Prestige Mini of Mahwah NJ, and Alexander Lindsay of Modern Arts Packaging for their generous supply of shopping bags.

Bag It Design0209:Postcard Page 2/28/09 8:04 PM Page 6

processes of the commodification of art. (These efforts were not helped by being written in a jargon that usually read as if inadequately translated from a Teutonic dialect.)

And they failed too, of course.

The history of art is a history of human abilities suborned to promoting faith, or power, or lunatic reason, or monstrous bourgeois egos. Compared to such, shopping used to be at least comparatively harmles Note the past tense here. Green grows the art world, oh.[HUH?] I think Matuschka’s shopping bags may be simply telling us to bag it.

“Serious” Matuschka, the artist on the barricades, is temporarily confined to the archives. The Matuschka of Bagit! is not frivolous—there’s nothing frivolous about the impact of Consu-merism—but in these pieces she

has taken the world off her shoulders.

Her touch is deft. She neither surrenders to her material, nor smothers it. She also teases a great of variety out of it, from the Rococo Minimalism of “Orange Sorbet” to the lively hominid that bounces across the J. Crew piece to the appropriately rayonniste mini-explosions on “Circle in the Square” to the scratchy, somewhat pubic look she gets—at least equally appropriately—from Victoria’s Secret and the “Pink Pussy Explosion.” Her play on “the bag” is casual and, at times, at odds with the sensuality and noose-like appearance of the rope that seems to dance effortlessly across these pages as she ironically pokes fun at consumers obsessed with branding.

The artist of Bagit! is a girl who, at least for the now, just wants to have fun.

Art: © Matuschka 2007 Introduction by Anthony Haden-Guest © 2007 Photo Credits: Tim Aanensen @ 2007 Quark Layout: Catherine Sandler Digital input: Walt Mendelson Published by Hard Press Editions, Lenox Mass Printed in China ISBN 978-1-88097-7-2-5 Dedicated to Chris Gagliardi & Mini Max-areeno Bambino Special thanks to: John Ravet Thomas Halaczinsky Lynn Dunham Jonathon Gams Additional gratitude goes to Chris Dodin and Prestige Mini of Mahwah NJ, and Alexander Lindsay of Modern Arts Packaging for their generous supply of shopping bags.

© MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditions.com

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www.matuschka.net

© MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditions.com

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www.matuschka.net

Crew © MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditions.com

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www.matuschka.net

Crew © MATUSCHKA 2008

Crew © MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditions.com

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www.matuschka.net

Crew © MATUSCHKA 2008

Record © MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditions.com

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www.matuschka.net

Record © MATUSCHKA 2008

Record © MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditions.com

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www.matuschka.net

Record © MATUSCHKA 2008

Orange Sorbet © MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditons.com

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www.matuschka.net

Orange Sorbet © MATUSCHKA 2008

Orange Sorbet © MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditons.com

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www.matuschka.net

Orange Sorbet © MATUSCHKA 2008

Ode to Lauder © MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditions.com

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Ode to Lauder © MATUSCHKA 2008

Ode to Lauder © MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditions.com

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Ode to Lauder © MATUSCHKA 2008

Chocolate Slice © MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditions.com

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www.matuschka.net

Chocolate Slice © MATUSCHKA 2008

Chocolate Slice © MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditions.com

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www.matuschka.net

Chocolate Slice © MATUSCHKA 2008

Tiffany © MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditions.com

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www.matuschka.net

Tiffany © MATUSCHKA 2008

Tiffany © MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditions.com

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www.matuschka.net

Tiffany © MATUSCHKA 2008

Candy Darling © MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditions.com

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www.matuschka.net

Candy Darling © MATUSCHKA 2008

Candy Darling © MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditions.com

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Candy Darling © MATUSCHKA 2008

The Dancer © MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditions.com

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The Dancer © MATUSCHKA 2008

The Dancer © MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditions.com

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www.matuschka.net

The Dancer © MATUSCHKA 2008

Betta © MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditions.com

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Betta © MATUSCHKA 2008

Betta © MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditions.com

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Betta © MATUSCHKA 2008

China Pop © MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditions.com

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China Pop © MATUSCHKA 2008

China Pop © MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditions.com

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China Pop © MATUSCHKA 2008

Champagne Champagne © MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditions.com

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Champagne Champagne © MATUSCHKA 2008

Champagne Champagne © MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditions.com

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Champagne Champagne © MATUSCHKA 2008

Oriental Red © MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditions.com

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Oriental Red © MATUSCHKA 2008

Oriental Red © MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditions.com

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Oriental Red © MATUSCHKA 2008

Cooper’s Circle © MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditions.com

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Cooper’s Circle © MATUSCHKA 2008

Cooper’s Circle © MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditions.com

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Cooper’s Circle © MATUSCHKA 2008

Ode to Kandinsky © MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditions.com

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Ode to Kandinsky © MATUSCHKA 2008

Ode to Kandinsky © MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditions.com

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Ode to Kandinsky © MATUSCHKA 2008

West Stockbridge © MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditions.com

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West Stockbridge © MATUSCHKA 2008

West Stockbridge © MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditions.com

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West Stockbridge © MATUSCHKA 2008

Bendel’s © MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditions.com

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Bendel’s © MATUSCHKA 2008

Bendel’s © MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditions.com

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Bendel’s © MATUSCHKA 2008

Ode to Paul Klee © MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditions.com

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Ode to Paul Klee © MATUSCHKA 2008

Ode to Paul Klee © MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditions.com

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Ode to Paul Klee © MATUSCHKA 2008

Sunnyside Up © MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditions.com

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Sunnyside Up © MATUSCHKA 2008

Sunnyside Up © MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditions.com

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Sunnyside Up © MATUSCHKA 2008

Target © MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditions.com

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Target © MATUSCHKA 2008

Target © MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditions.com

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Target © MATUSCHKA 2008

Godiva © MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditions.com

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Godiva © MATUSCHKA 2008

Godiva © MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditions.com

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Godiva © MATUSCHKA 2008

© MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditions.com

Purple Haze

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Purple Haze © MATUSCHKA 2008

Orange Mini © MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditions.com

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Orange Mini © MATUSCHKA 2008

Miami Vice © MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditions.com

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Miami Vice © MATUSCHKA 2008

© MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditions.com

Purple Haze

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www.matuschka.net

Purple Haze © MATUSCHKA 2008

Orange Mini © MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditions.com

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Orange Mini © MATUSCHKA 2008

Miami Vice © MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditions.com

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Miami Vice © MATUSCHKA 2008

Roper © MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditions.com

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Roper © MATUSCHKA 2008

Roper © MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditions.com

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Roper © MATUSCHKA 2008

Lemon Meringue © MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditions.com

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Lemon Meringue © MATUSCHKA 2008

Lemon Meringue © MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditions.com

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Lemon Meringue © MATUSCHKA 2008

Victoria’s Secret & the Pink Pussy Explosion © MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditions.com

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Victoria’s Secret & the Pink Pussy Explosion © MATUSCHKA 2008

Victoria’s Secret & the Pink Pussy Explosion © MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditions.com

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www.matuschka.net

Victoria’s Secret & the Pink Pussy Explosion © MATUSCHKA 2008

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Matuschka is a New York based artist and author whose photos and essays have been widely published in a variety of international publications since the 80s. Some of her accolades include the prize winning 1993 cover of the New York Times Sunday Magazine, the Rachael Carson Award for her work addressing environmental concerns, a Gold Award from the World Press Foundation and a Pulitzer Prize nomination for photography. In 2003, Life Magazine chose her iconic self-portrait, “Beauty Out of Damage” for their special tribute “One Hundred Pictures That Changed the World.”

Although known as an artist’s model and a photographer whose self-portraits raise questions about identity, power, and sexuality in an image driven society, Matuschka’s works on paper and canvas remain a constant and essential element of her art. Since the 70s, she has been creating new bodies of work which include everything from lampshades to large scale paintings, and yes, even bags!

Blue Haiku

© MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditions.com

www.matuschka.net

Matuschka lives and works in NYC. For more information about the artist, please visit her website: www.matuschka.net To order archival enlarged prints from this book please visit: www.matuschka.net/bagit/ Blue Haiku © MATUSCHKA 2008

The materials Matuschka uses in Bagit! are just that: empty shopping bags collaged with ropes and rich abstract imagery. Often the sex appeal of luxury products and brand name obsession is based on the gospel of consumerism: “I am what I buy.” Or as Matuschka puts it: “You Are What You Bag.” Savvy enough to bring humor and irony to a culture once consumed with labels and logos, the branding text on recycled shopping bags is removed and replaced with the artist’s abstractions. Matuschka’s play on the bag is causal and, at times, at odds with the sensuality and noose-like appearance of the rope that seems to dance effortlessly across these pages. While these derivative works resemble “bags” they can be framed, or sent as postcards to friends.

Bag It Design0209:Postcard Page 2/28/09 8:05 PM Page 62

Matuschka is a New York based artist and author whose photos and essays have been widely published in a variety of international publications since the 80s. Some of her accolades include the prize winning 1993 cover of the New York Times Sunday Magazine, the Rachael Carson Award for her work addressing environmental concerns, a Gold Award from the World Press Foundation and a Pulitzer Prize nomination for photography. In 2003, Life Magazine chose her iconic self-portrait, “Beauty Out of Damage” for their special tribute “One Hundred Pictures That Changed the World.”

Although known as an artist’s model and a photographer whose self-portraits raise questions about identity, power, and sexuality in an image driven society, Matuschka’s works on paper and canvas remain a constant and essential element of her art. Since the 70s, she has been creating new bodies of work which include everything from lampshades to large scale paintings, and yes, even bags!

Blue Haiku

© MATUSCHKA 2008 From the book BagIt! Published by Hard Press Editions www.hardpresseditions.com

www.matuschka.net

Matuschka lives and works in NYC. For more information about the artist, please visit her website: www.matuschka.net To order archival enlarged prints from this book please visit: www.matuschka.net/bagit/ Blue Haiku © MATUSCHKA 2008

The materials Matuschka uses in Bagit! are just that: empty shopping bags collaged with ropes and rich abstract imagery. Often the sex appeal of luxury products and brand name obsession is based on the gospel of consumerism: “I am what I buy.” Or as Matuschka puts it: “You Are What You Bag.” Savvy enough to bring humor and irony to a culture once consumed with labels and logos, the branding text on recycled shopping bags is removed and replaced with the artist’s abstractions. Matuschka’s play on the bag is causal and, at times, at odds with the sensuality and noose-like appearance of the rope that seems to dance effortlessly across these pages. While these derivative works resemble “bags” they can be framed, or sent as postcards to friends.

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postcard book

Introduction by

Anthony Haden-Guest "The shopping bag pieces in Matuschka's series are artful in every sense of that slippery word. The materials she uses in Bagit! are just that, empty shopping bags, but she has plucked them from the worlds of shopping, branding and packaging and turned them to her own ends..."

Hard Press Editions

a print and

bagit!

bagit!

bagit! a print and

Introduction by

Anthony Haden-Guest

postcard book

matuschka

MATUSCHKA

matuschka