Yvonne Jacquette (b.1934)is an American painter and printmaker known in particular for her depictions of aerial landscapes, especially her low-altitude and oblique aerial views of cities…

Michel Foucault was one of the most influential philosophers and cultural historians of the 20th Century, reconceiving power and identities as historically specific social relations and…

Cindy Sherman received an MFA from the State University of New York at Buffalo in 1976, where she studied photography. During this time she was also involved with HallWalls, an…

Joseph Beuys (1921–1986) was born in Kleve, Germany. After serving as a volunteer in the German military, Beuys attended the Dusseldorf Academy of Art to study sculpture, where in 1959…

At nineteen, Barbara Kruger (b. 1945) worked as a commercial artist designing for Conde Nast. The risky combination of contemporary art, commercial appeal and social critique runs…

Rackstraw Downes’s “observation” paintings, executed on-site at ponds, intersections, and baseball parks, began as a mischievous response to the dogma of style and modernist criticism.…

Reverend Howard Finster was a preacher-turned-folk artist. He created Paradise Gardens Park & Museum, a product of all his murals, drawings, sculptures, and mosaics—and Summerville,…

Chuck Close (b.1940) has been a leading figure in contemporary art since the early 1970s. As a young artist in the mid-’60s, Close turned away from the model of Abstract Expressionism to…

Dan Sandin designed the Image Processor that, partly because of his decision to give away the building plans, has effected an energetic and aesthetic…

Estelle Jussim (1928-2004) was regarded as one of the most influential voices in photography and media. An art historian and a communications theorist, Jussim wrote extensively about…

Les Levine has had a longstanding involvement with media. His works-video, installations, public posters, and other forms-have often dealt with the effect of images on our lives. "Media…

Confrontation is the element that defines Acconci’s work, from explorations of the body and self to his performances, videos, and installations to the more…

Lee Krasner (1908-1984) was born in New York and attended Cooper Union, the National Academy of Design, and the Hofmann School to study painting. Married to Jackson Pollack, Krasner's…

Conceptual artist Hans Haacke’s two most notorious works took unsavory Manhattan real-estate dealing as their subject, which triggered the cancellation of his exhibition Real Time Social…

Annette Michelson is a founding editor of the journal October and former professor of cinema studies at New York University. Before starting October, Michelson was the…