{"data":{"id":"2978","type":"artist","attributes":{"id":2978,"topgoose_id":1642,"tms_id":2978,"display_name":"Sherrie Levine","sort_name":"Levine Sherrie","display_date":"1947–","begin_date":"1947","end_date":"0","biography":"\u003cp\u003eTo make \u003ca href=\"/collection/works/10247\"\u003e\u003cem\u003eAfter Walker Evans: 4\u003c/em\u003e,\u003c/a\u003e one of her best-known works and a key example of what is termed Postmodern art, Sherrie Levine rephotographed one of Evans’s most iconic Depression-era pictures from a reproduction in an exhibition catalogue, presenting the image as her own. This work, from the series \u003cem\u003eAfter Walker Evans\u003c/em\u003e— along with copies of images by other established masters of photography such as \u003ca href=\"/artists/4032\"\u003eEdward Weston\u003c/a\u003e and \u003ca href=\"/artists/4793\"\u003eEliot Porter\u003c/a\u003e that she executed in the 1980s—exemplified the artistic strategy of appropriation, in which existing images, including those by other artists, are employed as the basis of one’s own production. Appropriation challenged values enshrined in the practice and theory of modern art: namely, the imperatives that an artwork be authentic, unique, and original. It also subverted the authority of a patriarchal canon of art history and underscored the centrality of authorship and historical context in our understanding of artworks.\u003c/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eLevine took the subject of \u003ca href=\"/collection/works/7823\"\u003e\u003cem\u003eLa\nFortune (After Man Ray): 4\u003c/em\u003e\u003c/a\u003e from a 1938 Man Ray painting titled\u003cem\u003e\u0026nbsp;La Fortune\u003c/em\u003e,\nalso in the Whitney’s collection, which\nfeatures a pool table set beneath a\nsky filled with brightly colored clouds. By\nproducing a three-dimensional object based\non a two-dimensional representation\nmade decades earlier, and by giving physical\nreality to something that in Man Ray’s\npainting is shown in a Surrealist manner at\nan impossibly oblique angle and with\nseemingly attenuated proportions, Levine\nagain demonstrates that the same\nsubject, re-created in a different medium\nand era, assumes new meaning for\nnew audiences. Her longstanding sensitivity\nto the contexts of image production and\ncirculation has taken on even greater\nrelevance in our increasingly digital age.\u003c/p\u003e","on_view":false,"artport":false,"biennial":true,"collection":true,"ulan_id":"500118782","wikidata_id":"Q319569","created_at":"2017-08-30T16:32:31.000-04:00","updated_at":"2026-04-26T01:30:12.463-04:00","links":{"artworks":"/api/artists/2978/artworks","exhibitions":"/api/artists/2978/exhibitions"}}}}