Untitled (Artists Space), c. 1978
Vintage gelatin silver print
8 x 10 inches
October 10, 2022
44 years ago, a close variant of this rare vintage print was exhibited at Artists Space, a non-profit SoHo gallery, in an exhibition featuring the debut of Cindy Sherman’s landmark series Untitled Film Stills. Sherman in fact set up this posed photograph in the offices at Artists Space, where she was then working, having recently relocated from Buffalo, New York. Typical of the approach that we now associate with the Pictures Generation artists, Sherman examines the popular media she grew up with—in this case costuming and staging her subjects to evoke mid-century American films. Sherman is seated on the right at the typewriter with her back to the camera; Artists Space director Helene Weiner can be seen seated in the back office. Helene Weiner would go on to found Metro Pictures in 1980, and would present an era-defining exhibition of Sherman’s work in December of that year.
The provenance of this print is truly special, as it was gifted in 1979 to Sherman’s friend and fellow artist John Maggiotto, who was curating Sherman’s first solo show in March of 1979 at Hallwalls in Buffalo, the artist-run exhibition space that Sherman had co-founded in 1974. This print embodies the links between Metro Pictures, Artists Space, and Hallwalls, which together served as crucial artistic laboratories for the now legendary group of artists who today are recognized as The Pictures Generation.
