Once Upon a Time: Narrative in Art

Watch a discussion led by Kelly Taxter, the Jewish Museum’s Barnett and Annalee Newman Curator of Contemporary Art, with artists Rachel Feinstein and Lisa Yuskavage, and filmmaker Tamara Jenkins, recorded on the evening of March 12, 2020. All participants contributed to the catalogue for the exhibition Rachel Feinstein: Maiden, Mother, Crone. Their conversation was held without an audience and recorded shortly before New York City’s stay-at-home order went into effect.

The group focused their attention on the uses and pitfalls of storytelling and autobiography in their work, and in particular, how gender and the expectations placed on women both motivate and complicate their respective practices. Questions and debates were raised around the validity and need for fantasy while fake news and assaults on facticity have eroded civic life, the problematics of identity-based art making, the early stages of cancel culture, the potential for failures and weaknesses to have positive outcomes, and the power of shame. 

The Mildred and George Weissman Program is endowed by Paul, Ellen, and Dan Weissman in honor of their parents.