Online Residency 2021
Biography
For more than 20 years, Anne Labovitz has made artwork that examines notions of contemporary portraiture, color, and the activation of creative space that connects us. She is committed to public artworks that are interactive and participatory as well as beautiful. Using color, mark-making, and dialogue, Labovitz creates site-specific work designed to create a visceral and emotional place for viewers. Colors go beyond language in her large-scale public works, which transform the space in which it is viewed. For these works, Labovitz employs a socially engaged dialogue process that is a unique and powerful platform for interconnectivity, public participation, and creativity.
Recent large-scale public works include two mosaics (2021) and two monumental installations (2019-22) at the Minneapolis-St Paul International Airport, and her six-year international touring exhibition, 122 Conversations (2013-19). 122 Conversations traveled to Rania, Iraqi Kurdistan, Växjö, Sweden, Petrozavodsk, Russia, Isumi City, Japan, Thunder Bay, Canada, and Duluth, MN.,
Previous solo exhibitions include Response at Burnet Fine Art & Advisory in Wayzata, MN, 122 Conversations in Iraqi Kurdistan, Växjö, Sweden, Petrozavodsk, Russia, Isumi City, Japan, Thunder Bay, Canada and Duluth, MN; Layers at Burnet Gallery, Le Méridien Chambers in Minneapolis; Composite Portraits at the Tweed Museum in Duluth, Minnesota; and Passions at the Athenaeum in La Jolla, CA. She has also exhibited at national and international venues, including Chapman Art Center at Cazenovia College in New York and Talgut die Schönen, in Kunste, Germany. Recent group shows include Someone Else’s Story at Burnet Gallery; Blood Memoirs at the Tweed Museum, curated by Amber-Dawn Bear Robe, and the Burnet Gallery’s group show at Select Fair NYC during Frieze Week in New York City. Recent public projects and private art commissions include: I Know You, a public collaborative drawing as a visiting artist for the Walker Art Center’s Free First Saturday, and Projecting the City for Northern Spark at the Weisman Art Museum. Labovitz’s works are part of permanent collections at the Minneapolis/St Paul Airport Collection, the Minnesota Museum of American Art (St Paul, MN), the Tweed Museum of Art (Duluth, MN), the Athenaeum Music & Arts Library in (La Jolla, CA), the Frederick R Weisman Art Museum (Minneapolis, MN), the International Gallery of Portrait (Bosnia-Herzegovina), and various galleries in Vaxjo, Sweden; Isumi, Japan; the University of Raparin, Iraqi Kurdistan; and Petrozavodsk, Russia.
Labovitz has work published in Studio Visit Magazine, Vol. 19, New American Paintings Midwest 2010, the Penang International Printmaking Exhibition 2010, and International Contemporary Artists, vol II and III. She has co-authored four books on portraiture with Australian artist Carole Best and provided illustrations for the children’s book, Honoral & Zarina. Her artwork has been discussed on Minnesota Public Radio and written up in the Chicago Sun Times, the Minneapolis Star Tribune, the Villager, the Duluth Tribune, Letoile Magazine, and the Taos Review. She recently has been named 2013 Artist of the Year in Duluth and, in 2015, was awarded keys to all six sister cities of Duluth Sister Cities International (DSCI). Duluth Mayor Emily Larson declared April 27, 2019, Anne Labovitz day. Labovitz is active in the art community in the Twin Cities metro area and is currently a member of the Board of Trustees for the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis and a former member of the Colleagues Advisory Board at the Weisman Art Museum on the campus of the University of Minnesota.
In addition to her art, Anne connects to communities through activism, anti-racism, and public co-creation. She was a participant in the initial cohort of the Woke Coach, serves on the Racial Equity Committee at the Walker, and the steering committee of Turn up the Turn Out. Her current long-term social practice project is the I Love You Institute. The I Love You Institute is an artist-led site-specific project urgently working with communities to address today’s world creatively. It combines art-making, social justice, radical kindness, and relational listening to normalize, saying “I Love You” as an alternative to division and conflict.
Upcoming plans and projects include a solo exhibition at Burnet Fine Art & Advisory (October) and a cohort of 22 artists dedicated to promoting voting and voter registration through Turn Up the Turn Out. Labovitz is currently an Artist In Residence at Art In Motion, Holdenford, MN working with 15 student apprentices, Public engagements with Festival UnBound, Bethlehem, PA. Labovitz is currently working on a private fence commission in Berlin, Germany. Labovitz’s community-based initiative, I Love You Institute, has multiple initiatives planned through 2020-2021.
Artist statement
I create work about how political, social, and cultural platforms can be turned into personal acts of care. Conversation and interaction are integral parts of my creative process, which allow me to explore a blurred boundary between gallery exhibit and social practice. Color, texture, installation, and community building all combine to create a shared space of connection and contemplation. For years I have examined the importance of human connection and its visual embodiment. My resulting praxis embodies connection, community building, and relational exchange.
The concept of radical care is especially important to how I approach my paintings and installations. It is my way of visually expressing Martin Buber’s I/Thou philosophy, which propagates the idea that life finds its meaningfulness through seeing one and other. Much of my work realizes radical care by utilizing a dialogue and engagement process, the results of which are directly incorporated into the painting or installation. This is a reciprocal practice; intimate conversations turn into my making process, which then is presented to contribute to a public, collective voice.
Links
Twitter @annelabovitz
Instagram @annelabovitz