Janet Biggs

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Janet Biggs (born 1959) is an American video artist, photographer and performance artist living in New York City.

Biggs' video works often include images of individuals engaged in obsessive and athletic activities. She has worked with champion wrestlers, football players, synchronized swimmers and equestrians. Biggs often uses the image of the horse as an emblem of female sexual sublimation and masculine power. Her earlier video work dealt with issues of psychosis and psychotropic drugs.[1]

Her recent work includes multi-discipline performances, often including multiple large-scale videos, live musicians, and athletes. At the 2007 Miami art fairs, she premiered "Enemy of the Good", which featured classical pianist Jose Luis Hernandez-Estrada, cellist Wil Martina, and equestrian Andres Rodriguez. Biggs has also worked with musicians Blake Fleming and Steve White (of the Blue Man Group).

Biggs' video work has been recently presented at the Gibbes Museum of Art (Charlotte, NC), Claire Oliver Gallery (New York City), Smack Mellon (Brooklyn, NY), Lumen Eclipse, the Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art (Ithaca, NY), North Sea Film Festival for Underwater Movies (the Hague, Netherlands), and the Houston Center of Photography.

In 2006, Hermès commissioned Biggs to create a new work of art for their flagship New York store. Biggs installed 11 large monitors in the store's Madison Avenue windows, as well as photographs of equestrian-themed images.[2]

Contemporary Magazine profiled Biggs in their March 2007 issue, and one of her photographs was used as the cover of Spot magazine's Summer 2007 issue.

Biggs was a recipient of the Anonymous Was a Woman grant in 2004 [3] , and received a painting fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts in 1989.

Biggs lives and works in New York City, and is represented by the Claire Oliver Gallery (New York) and Solomon Projects (Atlanta).

[edit] Selected Bibliography

Jenks, Debra: "Pulp Friction - Artists explore the underside of American culture." Chelsea Now, 14 December 2007.
Maschal, Richard: "Newly Minted" Charlotte Observer, 19 October 2007.
"Sport and Spectacle," Artkrush online magazine. 8 August 2007.
Byrd, Cathy: "Janet Biggs." Contemporary, March, 2007.
Matsumae, Ayano: "Janet Biggs" (review of Behind the Vertical at Hermés, New York ). Nileport Magazine (Japan). November, 2006.
Dunning, Jennifer: "A Horse and Dancers in an Ode to Interspecies Ties." New York Times, 10 October 2005.
Tommelleo, Donna: "Former UConn Players' Drills Become a Work of Art." Boston Globe, 27 November 2004.


[edit] References

  1. ^ Hirsh, Faye. "Janet Biggs at the Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art. (Ithaca, N.Y.)", Art in America, July 1, 2003. Retrieved on 2008-01-03. 
  2. ^ Perez, Magdalene. "Nearby Explosion Adds Extra Drama to Video Installation at Hermès", ArtInfo, August 11, 2006. Retrieved on 2008-01-04. 
  3. ^ "Anonymous Was a Woman Awards 10 Women Artists with $25,000 Grants", Absolute Arts, January 11, 2005. Retrieved on 2008-01-19. 

[edit] External links