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Face to Face. 15
Face to Face. 15
Face to Face. 15

Face to Face. 15

Artist (American, born 1956)
Date2001
MediumInk on paper
DimensionsOverall: 3 1/2 x 10 in., (8.9 x 25.4 cm,)
ClassificationsART
Credit LineMuseum Purchase
Object number2003.4.5
DescriptionBlurry image of dark trees against a light sky. Image taken with a pinhole camera held in artist's mouth.
On View
Not on view
Collections
Copyright© Ann Hamilton
Label TextAnn Hamilton's artwork investigates the interface between our perceptions of the world and how we reveal our interior selves to the world. While language is a dominant form of human expression, Hamilton is fascinated by cognition through multiple senses and through the body. She has stated: "I'm very interested in the hierarchies of our habits of perception, and how …we trust [words to] have more legitimacy than other kinds of information or ways of knowing. I think that I'm just trying to take this access and tilt it, so that the felt-quality of the words is equal to, but not dominant over, other kinds of sensory perceptions." To this end, Hamilton created a series of images made from a pinhole camera held in her mouth. In this hyper-visual world, she finds that "eyes have become voracious like mouths." Hamilton describes the process: "I have made a set of pinhole cameras that fit in my mouth. So the act of speaking is like the act of letting light enter my mouth [or the act of seeing] … As I open my mouth I am exposing film. " Hamilton's Portal series document herself looking at a mirror while in the Face to Face series she photographs other persons, places, and objects. MEM 10/03
Face to Face 53
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