Lisa Oppenheim - From Abigail to Jacob

This coming year, the Grazer Kunstverein continues its exploration into notions of social abstraction by presenting work by artists who investigate and translate their physical relationship towards their surroundings.

Over the past decade, artist Lisa Oppenheim (b. 1975, US) has steadily developed a unique body of work exploring the usage of (historical) imagery.

Balanced between appropriation and reconstruction, her work relies on substitutions applied to photographic and filmic records through which the historical and the present are transmitted and constituted through a language of today. One could define her work as an archaeology of time and visual culture. By exposing or even re-exposing archival material, Oppenheim bridges the past and the present by introducing new meaning to these historical images, often resulting in film and photographic projects.

From Abigail to Jacob (Works 2004–2014) is Lisa Oppenheim’s first larger institutional show that spans over a decade of production, ranging from earlier prints and slide works to more recent photograms and films.

The exhibition is developed in collaboration with Kunstverein in Hamburg and FRAC Champagne-Ardenne and includes the artist’s first monographic publication, published by Sternberg Press.