Jenny Holzer was born in Gallipolis, Ohio in 1950. She received her BA from Ohio University in Athens and her MFA from the Rhode Island School of Design. She also has honorary doctorates from the University of Ohio, the Rhode Island School of Design, and New School University.
She started out as an abstract artist. After moving to New York City she started working with text as art. The main focus of her work is the use of words, phrases, ideas, and poems in public space. When she first began creating text art she started by putting up street posters. Now she most often uses LED lights/signs. However she has incorporated many mediums in her work such as, bronze plaques, painted signs, stone benches, stickers, t-shirts, condoms, paintings, photographs, sound, video, light projection, and the internet.
Holzer doesn’t consider herself a poet though text does play an enormous role in her work. It is unclear to me when exactly she stopped writing her own “poetry” to use as text in her artwork, but more recently she has taken to using other poets’/writers’ text. She has used passages from de-classified US Army documents form the war in Iraq. Her work often talks about violence, feminism, sexuality, oppression, war, death, and power.
Holzer is most famous for her short statements “truisms”. Some are actually true and others are myths. She uses LED lights to display “truisms” on buildings, trees, and public spaces in general. Her work generally pokes at the advertising world by using phrases that mimic advertising slogans. Here are some of her "truisms":
‘a man can't know what it's like to be a mother’,
‘men are not monogamous by nature’,
‘money creates taste’,
‘a lot of professionals are crackpots’,
‘enjoy yourself because you can't change anything anyway’,
‘freedom is a luxury not a necessity’,
‘don't place too much trust in experts’.
Below are a few websites where you can see photographs of her work:
http://www.cheimread.com/artists/jenny-holzer/
http://www.designboom.com/contemporary/holzer.html
http://www.pbs.org/art21/artists/holzer/clip1.html
Here are a few examples of her work:
