Moral Injury / So Vote

“When art or writing functions, it raises ideas and has them felt, and this knowledge and feeling may be the basis for decent action.”—Jenny Holzer

As part of our celebration of women artists in honor of the 100th anniversary of the 19th amendment, The Phillips Collection presents a special installation on the façade of the museum by Jenny Holzer. This installation is presented in conjunction with Artists of Conscience: Women, Race, Representation on September 24, and our digital presentation of women artists from the collection in the Phillips House galleries this fall.

For more than forty years, Jenny Holzer has presented her astringent ideas, arguments, and sorrows in public places and international exhibitions, including the Venice Biennale, the Guggenheim Museums in New York and Bilbao, the Whitney Museum of American Art, and the Louvre Abu Dhabi. Her medium, whether formulated as a T-shirt, a plaque, or an LED sign, is writing, and the public dimension is integral to the delivery of her work. Starting in the 1970s with the New York City posters and continuing through her recent light projections on landscape and architecture, her practice has rivaled ignorance and violence with humor, kindness, and courage. Holzer received the Leone d’Oro at the Venice Biennale in 1990, the World Economic Forum’s Crystal Award in 1996, and the U.S. State Department’s International Medal of Arts in 2017. She holds honorary degrees from Williams College, the Rhode Island School of Design, The New School, and Smith College. She lives and works in New York.