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Hannah Wilke Through the Large Glass

Hannah Wilke

Elizabeth A. Sackler Center for Feminist Art

Through the Large Glass documents one of Wilke’s most effective and well-known performances, in which she executed a languid striptease behind the cracked transparent surface of Marcel Duchamp’s famous work The Bride Stripped Bare by Her Bachelors, Even (The Large Glass), 1915–23, at the Philadelphia Museum of Art in 1976. Dressed in a fedora and a man’s white satin suit, she strikes a series of poses evoking the style of 1970s fashion photography and then strips, cleverly suggesting bride and bachelor simultaneously. In her self-conscious affectation of a fashion model, Wilke willfully uses her own image and her sexuality to confront the erotic representation of women in art history and popular culture.
MEDIUM 16mm film on video, color, silent, 10 minutes
DATES 1976
ACCESSION NUMBER 2008.38
CREDIT LINE Frank Sherman Benson Fund
PROVENANCE Prior to 2008, provenance not yet documented; by 2008, acquired by Electronic Arts Intermix, New York, NY; 2008, purchased by the Brooklyn Museum.
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MUSEUM LOCATION This item is not on view
CAPTION Hannah Wilke (American, 1940-1993). Hannah Wilke Through the Large Glass, 1976. 16mm film on video, color, silent, 10 minutes Brooklyn Museum, Frank Sherman Benson Fund, 2008.38. © artist or artist's estate (Photo: Photograph courtesy Electronic Arts Intermix, New York., CUR.2008.38.jpg)
IMAGE overall, CUR.2008.38.jpg. Photograph courtesy Electronic Arts Intermix, New York.
"CUR" at the beginning of an image file name means that the image was created by a curatorial staff member. These study images may be digital point-and-shoot photographs, when we don\'t yet have high-quality studio photography, or they may be scans of older negatives, slides, or photographic prints, providing historical documentation of the object.
RIGHTS STATEMENT © Marsie, Emanuelle, Damon, and Andrew Scharlatt, Hannah Wilke Collection & Archive, Los Angeles/Licensed by VAGA at Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York. Courtesy Electronic Arts Intermix, New York.
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