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Image Not Available for If the Leader Only Knew from the Punctum Series
If the Leader Only Knew from the Punctum Series
Image Not Available for If the Leader Only Knew from the Punctum Series

If the Leader Only Knew from the Punctum Series

Artist (Born in Plainfield, New Jersey, 1976)
Date2014
MediumBronze
Dimensions7 1/2 × 63 × 7 1/4 inches (19.1 × 160 × 18.4 cm)
ClassificationsSculpture
Credit LinePromised gift of Marjorie (P’16, P’19, P’19) and Michael Levine (B.S.’84, P’16, P’19, P’19)
Object numberL.7.2015.1
Collections
  • ART OF THE UNITED STATES
  • MODERN & CONTEMPORARY
Edition3 + 1 AP
State2
Label TextFor the Punctum Series, Hank Willis Thomas collected material from twentieth-century German publications and archives. He selected details from photographs of the Holocaust and the collapse of the Berlin Wall, removing the imagery from its original context and shaping it into three-dimensions. In this sculpture, several sets of anonymous hands grab onto a string of barbed-wire fencing. The wire might call to mind concentration camps in Germany during World War II, or even the increasing incarceration of people of color in the United States. By presenting only a small element of a larger scene, Thomas allows viewers to provide their own narratives and to engage in the process of identity formation. The artist’s use of bronze, an ancient medium, lends physical and symbolic gravity to the subject while firmly placing contemporary social injustices within the history of art.
ProvenancePurchased by donors from Jack Shainman Gallery, New York (2015). Jack Shainman Gallery acquired the work directly from the artist.