The notions of difference and repetition have been part of philosophy and art practices for thousands of years. Artists have commonly employed repetition – the creation of artworks in series or the making of multiples and copies – in their work for a variety of reasons, ranging from the commercial to the subversive. Yet, crucial differences are often embedded within the process of iteration. Repetition and Difference brings together objects from the Museum’s collection and works by contemporary artists that examine how differences and derivations can reveal significant meaning. The exhibition is titled after Gilles Deleuze’s seminal text Difference and Repetition, first published in French in 1968, a landmark book that fundamentally questioned concepts of identity and representation to propose how multiplicity replaces the ideas of essence, substance and possibility.
Featured artists include: Walead Beshty, Sarah Crowner, Abraham Cruzvillegas, N. Dash, John Houck, Koo Jeong A, Kris Martin, Amalia Pica and Hank Willis Thomas.
Repetition and Difference
March 13 – August 9, 2015
The Jewish Museum
1109 5th Ave at 92nd St
New York, NY 10128
+1 212 423 3200