Design Office with Kim Gordon – since 1980
September 7–October 19, 2013 320 West 13th Street
White Columns

Design Office (client: Dan Graham)

Pussy Galore

Larry Gagosian

Band Name Sculpture: Sonic Youth


Design Office logo








Untitled

Making the Nature Scene: Rock Clubs in New York, c. 1983

Making the Nature Scene: Rock Clubs in New York, c. 1983 and Trash, Drugs and Male Bonding, c. 1980

Furniture Arranged for the Home Office

Wreath Painting: Northhampton, MA

Untitled (from Dead Already at Reena Spraulings)

Untitled (from the Boyfriend series)

Untitled (from the Boyfriend series)

Untitled (from the Boyfriend series)

Untitled (from the Boyfriend series)

Untitled (from the Boyfriend series)

Twitter Painting

T-Shirt sketch for Design Office with Kim Gordon - since 1980

Noise Band Painting: Weak Sisters

Untitled (from Desiring Machines)

Untitled

Vitrine with various archive materials

Lottie

Noise Nomads (from Rock, Paper, Scissors)

Untitled

Julie Cafritz (from Dead Already at Reena Spaulings)

Guitar Performance text

Audience

Club in the Shadow

Documentation of Club in the Shadow

Documentation of Two Grahams (from Dead Already at Reena Spaulings)

Stairway

L.A. house

Charlie

Untitled (from Dead Already at Reena Spaulings)

Untitled

X-Girl Tennis

X-Girl movie, directed by Phil Morrison

X-Girl t-shirt

Car Landscape

Car Landscape
Press Release
White Columns is pleased to announce ‘Design Office with Kim Gordon – Since 1980’, the first survey exhibition of Kim Gordon’s ongoing art practice.
Kim Gordon studied at the Otis Art Institute in Los Angeles in the late 1970s and has continued to work as an artist since then. Her first solo exhibition, presented under the name ‘Design Office’ took place at White Columns in 1981. The current exhibition includes photographs, writings, videos, paintings, sculptures and archival materials relating to Gordon’s activities between 1980 and 2013.
In a 1980 statement about ‘Design Office’ Gordon wrote: “… the general area of interest for myself is experimental, using art to deconstruct design, … and design to deconstruct art as it exists within varying life styles …” For the past thirty years Gordon has worked consistently across disciplines and across distinct cultural fields: art, design, writing (ZG, Real Life, Artforum etc.), fashion (X-Girl), music (inc. Sonic Youth, Free Kitten, Body/Head), and film/video (both an actress and director.) About Gordon’s mercurial practice, Ben Ratliff writing in The New York Times observed:
“Being able to see and hear Ms. Gordon more clearly now, in primary roles, helps suggests a pattern. Her path has seemed continually accidental or indirect, one side-door entrance after another. As an adjunct of making art, she became a writer. As an adjunct of being a writer, she joined a band. Her work in a band, and the discipline of developing a public visual persona, may have led her toward fashion. And so on.”
On view at White Columns are key video works, including ‘Making The Nature Scene’ (1983) shot in New York’s Danceteria nightclub, and the ‘X-Girl Movie’ (1995) – a promotional film for Gordon’s and Daisy Von Furth’s clothing line, shot by Phil Morrison in the manner of the French New Wave cinema. Also on view are documentary videos of Gordon and Jutta Koether’s collaborative performances and installations, including images from the now legendary month-long series of events they organized as ‘The Club In The Shadow’ at Kenny Schachter’s downtown space in 2003.
Gordon’s paintings include the ongoing ‘Noise Painting’ series, depicting the names of experimental and noise groups (e.g. ‘Weak Sisters’, ‘Pussy Galore’ and – on the floor, crumpled into a ball – ‘Sonic Youth’); a series of paintings depicting the names of contemporary galleries and gallery owners (including ‘Larry Gagosian’, ‘Barbara Gladstone’, and ‘White Columns’); works from the untitled ‘From The Boyfriend’ series – Rorschach-like images painted on used denim skirts, and the most recent series of ‘Twitter Paintings’ sourced from the Twitter streams of ‘GIRLS’ producer Jenni Konner, critic Jerry Saltz, and artist Richard Prince among others.
A new limited-edition vinyl solo recording ‘Walks With Men’ by Kim Gordon will accompany the exhibition, released on ‘The Sound of White Columns’ label. A publication anthologizing Gordon’s activities as an artist will follow in the fall.
Two newly commissioned Design Office t-shirts will also be available from the gallery.
Kim Gordon’s art has been shown internationally including recent solo exhibitions at KS Art, New York and Reena Spaulings Fine Art, New York, among others. Her collected writings – which originally appeared in Artforum, ZG and Real Life magazines – are forthcoming from the Sternberg Press. A widely recorded musician Kim Gordon is a founding member of Sonic Youth and performs as Body/Head (with Bill Nace.) In September 2013 Body/Head will release their debut album on Matador, and play select dates in both the United States and Europe.
In November 2013, ISSUE Project Room in Brooklyn concludes its ten-year anniversary festival with a capstone, two-night benefit concert series honoring Kim Gordon. Over two evenings, Gordon will be joined in performances by collaborators Ikue Mori, Bill Nace, Jutta Koether, with more to be announced. For more information on this event, visit: www.issueprojectroom.org
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For further information about White Columns’ exhibitions please contact: info@whitecolumns.org
Related Press
Flavorwire - September 10, 2013
The Guardian - September 9, 2013
W Magazine - September 9, 2013
We Heart - September 9, 2013
NME - September 8, 2013
The New York Times - September 6, 2013
Style.com - September 6, 2013
The Huffington Post - September 3, 2013
Cura - September 2, 2013
Time Out NY - August 27, 2013
Complex - August 6, 2013
Paper Magazine - August 2, 2013
White Columns
Design Office (client: Dan Graham)
Pussy Galore
Larry Gagosian
Band Name Sculpture: Sonic Youth
Design Office logo
Untitled
Making the Nature Scene: Rock Clubs in New York, c. 1983
Making the Nature Scene: Rock Clubs in New York, c. 1983 and Trash, Drugs and Male Bonding, c. 1980
Furniture Arranged for the Home Office
Wreath Painting: Northhampton, MA
Untitled (from Dead Already at Reena Spraulings)
Untitled (from the Boyfriend series)
Untitled (from the Boyfriend series)
Untitled (from the Boyfriend series)
Untitled (from the Boyfriend series)
Untitled (from the Boyfriend series)
Twitter Painting
T-Shirt sketch for Design Office with Kim Gordon - since 1980
Noise Band Painting: Weak Sisters
Untitled (from Desiring Machines)
Untitled
Vitrine with various archive materials
Lottie
Noise Nomads (from Rock, Paper, Scissors)
Untitled
Julie Cafritz (from Dead Already at Reena Spaulings)
Guitar Performance text
Audience
Club in the Shadow
Documentation of Club in the Shadow
Documentation of Two Grahams (from Dead Already at Reena Spaulings)
Stairway
L.A. house
Charlie
Untitled (from Dead Already at Reena Spaulings)
Untitled
X-Girl Tennis
X-Girl movie, directed by Phil Morrison
X-Girl t-shirt
Car Landscape
Car Landscape