Bruce Nauman: Disappearing Acts

October 21, 2018–March 17, 2019

The Museum of Modern Art and MoMA PS1 will collaborate on the first comprehensive retrospective in 25 years devoted to the work of American artist Bruce Nauman (b. 1941). Co-organized by The Museum of Modern Art and Schaulager Basel, Bruce Nauman: Disappearing Acts will draw upon the rich holdings of both institutions and over 70 lenders. Encompassing Nauman’s entire career, the exhibition will occupy the Museum’s entire sixth floor and the whole of MoMA PS1. This joint presentation will provide an opportunity to experience Nauman’s command of a wide range of mediums, from drawing, printmaking, photography, and neon to performance, video, film, sculpture, and architecturally scaled environments. The exhibition’s title refers to the manifold appearances of disappearance in the artist’s work. For Nauman, disappearance is both a real phenomenon and an ample metaphor for grappling with the anxieties of both the creative process and of navigating the everyday world.

Since 1970, Nauman has frequently worked on a monumental scale, necessitating this expansive presentation across both of MoMA’s locations. Both venues include works in all mediums and from all phases of Nauman’s career, offering distinct but complementary perspectives on his wide-ranging practice. The characteristics of the two spaces have shaped the curatorial approach to each: the flexibility of The Museum of Modern Art’s sixth-floor exhibition galleries will accommodate six of the artist’s largest works, alongside a representative selection of his production across the decades; while the suite of former classrooms in MoMA PS1’s historic building will house over 120 works in a more traditional retrospective format. At The Museum of Modern Art, the exhibition moves swiftly from Nauman’s early work examining his own body to works that directly involve the viewer, who must navigate a series of room-sized installations that dictate movement and stress the senses. At MoMA PS1, Disappearing Acts will unfold chronologically, but with strategic interruptions to highlight consistencies in a seemingly disparate body of work, as Nauman revisits earlier motifs and concerns with new urgency.

Organized by The Museum of Modern Art, New York, and Laurenz Foundation, Schaulager, Basel.