Joan Jonas: They Come to Us Without a Word

Marc Notes: This catalogue is published in conjunction with the exhibition Joan Jonas: They Come to Us without a Word, United States Pavilion, organized by the MIT List Visual Arts Center for the 56th International Art Exhibition, Venice Biennale, Venice, Italy.; Includes bibliographical references. Publisher Marketing: "They Come to Us without a Word" documents Joan Jonas' (born 1936) project for the US Pavilion of the 56th Venice Biennale, an installation that incorporates multiple components, including projected videos (with music by Jason Moran), drawings and photographs. Each section of the pavilion represents a particular creature (bees, fish) or natural condition. Recited fragments of ghost stories sourced from the oral tradition of Cape Breton, Nova Scotia, form a continuous narrative linking one room to the next. Designed with Jonas' close collaboration, this book features an extensive collection of images selected by the artist, including stills, drawings and photographs. Also included is a major new text by Jonas herself, as well as significant texts from Ann Reynolds and Marina Warner, and an interview with the artist by Ingrid Schaffner. Contributor Bio:  Bauer, Ute Meta Bauer, a co-curator of Documenta11, was born in Stuttgart, Germany. She was educated as an artist in visual communication and has worked as a freelance curator since 1985. Since 1996 she has been a professor of theory, practice, and mediation of contemporary art at the Academy of Fine Arts in Vienna. Contributor Bio:  Reynolds, Ann Ann Reynolds is Associate Professor of Art and Art History at the University of Texas, Austin. Contributor Bio:  Jonas, Joan Joan Jonas was born in 1936 in New York, where she currently lives and works. She received an M. F. A. in Sculpture from Columbia University, New York, in 1965. Her first performance retrospective was at the Stedelijk van Abbemuseum, Eindhoven (1979) and her first US retrospective was at the University Art Museum, Berkeley (1980) (Van Abbe Museum, Eindhoven, 1981). She has exhibited at The Museum of Modern Art, New York; the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; The Institute of the Contemporary Art, Boston, MA; The Kitchen, New York, and Pat Hearn Gallery, New York. Jonas has had major retrospectives at the Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam (1994), and Galerie der Stadt, Stuttgart, Germany (2000), and was represented in Documenta 11, Kassel, Germany (2002).