Jon Kessler
(American, born 1957)
Biography
Jon Kessler is a contemporary American artist best known for his kinetic sculptures and installations. Building complex, exposed mechanisms that include robotic figures, security cameras, and old television monitors, his work conveys a sense of anxiety surrounding technology and surveillance. “My interest in what happens between the viewer and the art object has remained consistent,” he has explained. “My work continues to self-consciously play in that arena, controlling the spectator's experience of the piece, while also offering a glimpse of the machinery of that manipulation.” Born in 1957 in Yonkers, NY, received his BFA from SUNY at Purchase in 1980 and entered the Whitney Museum Independent Study Program the same year. In 1994, he became a professor at Columbia University, helping to reinvigorate the school’s MFA program. After the 9/11 attacks, Kessler’s playful work took on a more politically driven focus, incorporating more sinister elements into their scope, as seen in his The Palace at 4 a.m. (2005). Titled after an Alberto Giacometti sculpture, the work depicts a surreal vision of Saddam Hussein’s palace ransacked by American forces. Kessler continues to live and work in New York, NY. Today, his works are held in the collections of The Museum of Modern Art in New York, the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis, and the Carnegie Museum of Art in Pittsburgh, among others.
Jon Kessler Artworks
Jon Kessler
(71 results)
English (US)
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