Jordan Wolfson's (Female figure)

Exhibition Website

Oct 11 2018 - Jan 20 2019

The Broad

Los Angeles, CA

Artist Jordan Wolfson's (Female figure), 2014, is an immersive environment that features a robotic sculpture. For seven minutes, the robot gives monologues and dances to pop songs. Startling and unnerving, the work raises the specter of misogyny and exposes fissures in pop culture. It challenges the ways women are represented, and the ways images of women are consumed.

The sculpture resembles a hypersexualized female, but it also complicates such a reading and evades easy consumption. In a brightly lit room that is more sterile than sensual, the robot wears a witch mask and is covered in black smudges. The figure faces a mirrored wall to which it is attached by a rod piercing its torso. Traditionally, art is a one-directional experience: you alone observe the artwork. Here, however, the robot uses facial recognition software to “look at” the viewer, returning your stare. This may feel like the sculpture is objectifying you, treating you like an object.

(Female figure) challenges assumptions about gender, sexuality and even our status as human subjects.

Credit: Exhibition overview from museum website.          

  • Sculpture
  • American
  • Contemporary
  • Jordan Wolfson

Exhibition Venues & Dates

  • Oct 11 2018 - Jan 20 2019

    The Broad

    Los Angeles, CA