Exhibition 'Arthur Jafa—Less Is Morbid' in Moma
“Less Is Morbid is a counter death wish,” says artist Arthur Jafa. Originally from Tupelo, Mississippi, and trained as an architect and cinematographer, he has become well-known for his collages, montages, assemblages, and installations—combining images imbued with what he calls “affective capacity,” or the emotional power of association.
For this exhibition—the latest in MoMA’s Artist’s Choice series—Jafa has selected over 80 objects from the Museum’s collection. Placing things beside one another, he creates relationships between pictures and between their makers: Jean-Michel Basquiat and Cy Twombly; Lygia Clark, Roy DeCarava, Kase2, and Ming Smith; Piet Mondrian and Lutisha Pettway. Many of the works share an allover approach to composition in which the picture exceeds its physical frame. Seen together, the installation of works collapses typically opposed ideas and approaches—minimalist/maximalist, sparse/dense, atomic/cosmological, individual/collective—as well as the hierarchies that emerge from this kind of binary thinking.
Located at: MoMA, Floor 1, 1 North
