KATHLEEN WHITE – A YEAR OF FIRSTS
2018-01-01These intimate narratives take the form of drawing, painting, sculpture, and performance. Never simply an outside observer, White used her love for others as well as her own reality—happiness, grief, love, sadness—to expose other people to something beautiful. Tragedy and loss became ever-present in White’s life. The title work of this exhibition, A Year of Firsts, 2001, is an installation of 40 works on paper that circles the entire gallery. It can be read like a book, or more accurately a diary and unique system of language, as it takes you through White’s year after; year after her father’s death, her brother’s death, her sister’s death, and the many friends that were lost to AIDS. Anchoring the gallery entrance are two small cars made of Sculptamold and oil paint. White made hundreds of these cars, in different sizes and colors. They were, for White, vessels for fantasy, adventures, good and bad fortune. The final component is a performance The Spark Between L And D, 1988, which plays on four screens in the middle of the gallery. Wearing a nurse’s uniform covered with flags from around the world, White first beats herself up then licks the blood off of her fingers before bandaging herself up, almost mummy-like, the whole time singing “On Broadway” until she is so bound, she can no longer make a sound.
Opposite – A Year of Firsts, 2001
Exhibition runs through to January 27th, 2018
Martos Gallery
41 Elizabeth St
NY 10013
New York
