Art=Text=Art: Works by Contemporary Artists from the Sally and Wynn Kramarsky Collection

Celebrating the dynamic dialogue of art and language from 1960 to 2012, Art=Text=Art presents more than 100 American drawings, prints, conceptual works on paper, and artists' books selected from the internationally respected collection of Sally and Wynn Kramarsky. In this major exhibition, 48 artists explore the form, function, and multiple interpretations of language. Juxtaposing both the verbal and the visual aspects of individual words, passages of text, numbers, and symbols, these works prompt insights into wide-ranging subjects: from daily "to do" lists to literature, from individual identity issues to mapping nature's phenomena or the universe of mathematics. 

Art=Text=Art begins with key examples of modern and contemporary text art of the 1960s by pioneering Conceptual and Minimal artists, notably Carl Andre, Mel Bochner, Sol LeWitt, and Lawrence Weiner. Their art offers direct visual engagement with profound, verbally expressed ideas. Works by William Anastasi, Jane Hammond, and Ed Ruscha examine the structure of language, individual words, or symbols as a means to explore their effectiveness as tools of communication. Richard Serra’s landmark Verb List (1967–68) presents columns of verbs emphasizing them as “actions to relate to oneself, material, place and process," serving as the artist’s manifesto. Jasper Johns masterfully explores number shapes and series, prompting contemplation about numerical meanings. The Garden of Scripts (Villandry) by Alice Aycock resembles a landscape architecture design, yet it is a metaphorical topiary labyrinth comprising ancient languages and letterforms. Other featured artists include Suzanne Bocanegra, Jill Baroff, Trisha Brown, Annabel Daou, Stephen Dean, Elena Del Rivero, Christine Hiebert, Mark Lombardi, Stefana McClure, Karen Schiff, and filmmaker John Waters. An online catalog features essays, works of fiction, and sound pieces by more than 35 guest contributors.