The Phillips Collection Announces Outdoor Installation by Jenny Holzer

“Moral Injury / So Vote” to be installed on the façade of the museum in conjunction with Artists of Conscience virtual panel

WASHINGTON— 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 outside 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.

“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

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 InternationalMedal 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.

“In a year that has caused so much turmoil, Jenny Holzer’s words are a powerful reminder of the moment we are in, as a museum in the nation’s capital, on the eve of a critical election. One hundred years ago women were granted the right to vote, but not every woman was able to exercise that right, and we are proud to present a grouping of programs—art inside and outside our walls and a rich discussion—that honors the women past and present that have fought for representation,” says Phillips Collection Vradenburg Director and CEO Dorothy Kosinski.

Academic and artistic partners The Phillips Collection and the University of Maryland (UMD) will present the Artists of Conscience panel digitally, on Thursday, September 24, 2020, from 5:30 to 7 pm. Entitled“Woman, Race, Representation,” the panel will address the significance of the women’s suffrage movement in the U.S. The year 2020 marks the 100th anniversary of the 19th amendment, which granted white women the constitutional right to vote. The evening’s speakers will commemorate this milestone of US democracy.

This year’s Artists of Conscience celebrates women’s accomplishments related to issues of social justice, while acknowledging the continued struggle for equality and inclusion in all facets of life, including education, artistic practice, and philanthropy. The installation, spread throughout the second floor of the Phillips House (currently closed due to COVID-19) and presented online, honors Susan Unterberg’simportant contribution to the artistic community. It is complemented by additional works by women artists from the Phillips’s permanent collection, past and present.