This book, Barbara Kruger's most comprehensive since the publication accompanying her 1999 retrospective at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, will offer a historical look at some of her most famous artworks and installations (including her early explorations pairing photographs and text, humorous sculptures, and full-room installations), including works from over the past fiveyears, much of which has yet to be published, such as the recent Women in the City public art exhibition, organized by L.A. gallerist Emi Fontana of West of Rome, Inc., as well as her installations for the Broad Contemporary Art Center at LACMA, and the Moderna Museet, Stockholm. Beautifully and boldly designed by Lorraine Wild, the book will embody a manifesto-like aesthetic. Barbara Kruger's background in design is evident in the work for which she is now internationally renowned. She layers found photographs from existing sources with pithy and aggressive text that involves the viewer in the struggle for power and control. In their trademark black letters against a slash of red background, some of her instantly recognisable slogans read "I shop therefore I am," and "Your body is a battleground." Much of her text questions the viewer about feminism, classicism, consumerism, and individual autonomy and desire, although her black-and-white images are culled from the mainstream magazines that sell the very ideas she is disputing. As well as appearing in museums and galleries worldwide, Kruger's work has appeared on billboards, buscards, posters, a public park, a train station platform in Strasbourg, France, and in other public commissions. She has taught at the California Institute of Art, The School of the Art Institute of Chicago, and the University of California, Berkeley. She lives in New York and Los Angeles.
