Shirin Neshat, Marie Douglas David, 2006, black and white photograph on Ilford Digital Fiber Paper, 30×50”.

 

Extraordinary, original portraits by leading contemporary artists.

The BOMB Portrait Project is an ongoing program in collaboration with some of the most exciting artists and photographers working today. For more information on commissioning a portrait of you and/or your loved ones, please contact Betsy Sussler at (718) 636-9100×103.

Upcoming artists for 2007–2008 include:

Robert Polidori
Martha Rosler
Billy Sullivan
Fred Wilson

The following artists were a part of the BOMB Portrait Project in 2004–2007:

Tina Barney
Chuck Close
Gregory Crewdson
Eric Fischl
Adam Fuss
Ralph Gibson
Nan Goldin
Vera Lutter
Vik Muniz
Shirin Neshat
Laurie Simmons

William Wegman, Alexander and Mattie, 2003, Color Polaroid, 80×40”. Collection of Ann Fitzpatrick Brown.

Eric Fischl, Untitled (Detail), 2004, Color Polaroid, 80×40”. Private collection.

Vera Lutter, The Hedges, 2006, Silver Gelatin Print, 30×40”. Private Collection.

 

2007–2008 Artists and BOMB Portrait Descriptions

 

Robert Polidori’s extraordinary photographs of places in transformation, from Versailles’s restoration to Havana mansions’ disintegration, were featured in BOMB’s 2007 spring issue. The interview can be read in its entirety by inserting his name in our search archive or clicking here. The Metropolitan Museum of Art commissioned him to photograph the devastation in New Orleans after Katrina; “After the Flood” was the most widely attended show in the Met’s recent history. While Polidori is known for his site photographs, his portraits, in situ, started appearing during his time in Havana: men sitting in cars, on benches outside of their homes, women in their domiciles… He is a world-class photographer who has published eleven books of photography and shows at the Edwynn Houk Gallery, Pace/McGill and Flowers East in London.

Robert Polidori’s commissioned portrait will be taken in the purchaser’s home, in color, 30×40”.

 

Martha Rosler works in video, photo-text, installation, and performance, and has published ten books, including titles on art history, sociology, women studies, architecture, urban planning, film and media theory, and contemporary cultural studies. Her work has been seen at several Whitney biennials; the Institute of Contemporary Art in London; the Museum of Modern Art in New York; the Dia Center for the Arts in New York; and was included in Documenta XII in Kassell, Germany. A retrospective of her work has been shown in five European cities and in New York at the New Museum and the International Center of Photography. She was recently awarded the Oskar Kokoschka Prize, Austria’s highest award in the fine arts. She is represented by Mitchell Innes & Nash and lives in Brooklyn.

The Rosler will be a portrait in two parts. Martha will spend a few hours with the purchaser during which time she will collect mementos and metaphorical objects as well as photograph the subject(s). The objects will be made into a sculpture and constitute the first part of the portrait, an assemblage. One of the photographs, a 20×24” color print, will become the second half of the portrait, to be received six months after the event. At that point it will join the assemblage, as a memory of time passing, a memento mori.

 

Billy Sullivan was born in New York City in 1946. In 1987 he received a National Endowment of the Arts grant. His most recent solo and group exhibitions were held at Regen Projects in Los Angeles; the Harley Baldwin Gallery in Aspen; the Parrish Art Museum in South Hampton, New York; the Galleria Francesca Kaufmann in Milan, Italy; and, most recently, at the Whitney Biennial 2006, New York. Sullivan is represented in New York City by Nicole Klagsbrun Gallery.

The Sullivan portrait has just SOLD.

 

Fred Wilson is represented by PaceWildenstein in New York City. He was born in the Bronx, New York in 1954. Wilson creates new exhibition contexts for the display of art and artifacts found in museum collections, along with wall labels, sound, lighting, and non-traditional pairings of objects. He received a John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation Achievement Award and the Larry Aldrich Foundation Award. He is the Distinguished Visiting Fellow in Object, Exhibition, and Knowledge at Skidmore College. He represented the US at the Biennial Cairo (1992) and Venice Biennale. The Studio Museum in Harlem has featured his work.

Fred Wilson would like to visit the purchaser’s home or establishment, gather objects there that he feels are indicative of the environment and the person/family. Fred will then create an installation of these objects on site, and take a picture of the installation. That picture, a unique print, will constitute the finished portrait.

 

For more information on commissioning a portrait of you and/or your loved ones, please contact Betsy Sussler at (718) 636-9100 ×103.