Martha Rosler

Martha Rosler at New Langton Arts in San Francisco, March 1980. Photo: Fred Lonidier.
Born	July 29, 1943(1943-07-29) Brooklyn, New York, United States
Web	UbuWeb Film, Aaaaarg, Wikipedia
Collections	MoMA, Van Abbe, Stedelijk

Martha Rosler works in video, photography, text, installation, and performance. Her work focuses on the public sphere, exploring issues from everyday life and the media to architecture and the built environment, especially as they affect women.

Rosler has for many years produced works on war and the national security climate, connecting life at home with the conduct of war abroad, in which her photomontage series played a critical part. She has also published several books of photographs, texts, and commentary on public space, ranging from airports and roads to housing and gentrification.

A retrospective of her work has been shown internationally, and her writing is published widely in publications such as Artforum, e-flux journal, and Texte zur Kunst.

Rosler has been included in numerous group exhibitions and biennials. In 2012, she presented a new series of photographs, taken during her trip to Cuba in January 1981, and in November, she presented the Meta-Monumental Garage Sale at MoMA in New York. Her most recent publications include Culture Class (2013; Spanish trans.: Clase cultural. Arte y gentrificación, 2014), on artists and gentrification; Martha Rosler: Irrespective (2018), accompanying her survey show in New York; and La Dominación y lo cotidiano: ensayos y guiones (2019), a book of essays and scripts in translation.

Rosler lives and works in Brooklyn. (2023)

Works

Video

• Martha Rosler Reads Vogue: Wishing, Dreaming, Winning, Spending, Paper Tiger TV, 1982.

• Works on UbuWeb

Publications

(books, catalogues, writings)

• Service: A Trilogy on Colonization, New York: Printed Matter, 1978, 12+14+11+11 pp; repr., 2008. Artist. Publisher. Book launch, [1].

• 3 Works, Halifax: Press of the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design, 1981, 88 pp, IA; 2006.
  • "In, Around, and Afterthoughts (On Documentary Photography)", in 3 Works, 1981; repr. in The Context of Meaning: Critical Histories of Photography, ed. Richard Bolton, MIT Press, 1989, pp 303-325, IA; repr. in Photography: A Critical Reader, ed. Liz Wells, London: Routledge, 2000.
    • "I, omkring og ettertanker (om dokumenterende fotografi)", UKS-Forum for Samtidskunst 1-2, Oslo, 1979. (Norwegian)
    • "Drinnen, drumherum und nachtragliche Gedanken (zur Dokumentarfotografie)", in Martha Rosler. Positionen in der Lebenswelt, ed. Sabine Breitwieser, Vienna: Generali Foundation, and Cologne: Walther Koenig, 1999. (German)

• If You Lived Here: The City in Art, Theory, and Social Activism: A Project by Martha Rosler, ed. Brian Wallis, Seattle: Bay Press, and New York: Dia Art Foundation, 1991; repr., New York: New Press, 1999, x+312 pp.

• "In the Place of the Public: Observations of a Frequent Flyer", Assemblage 25, Dec 1994, pp 44-79. [2]

• Rights of Passage, Kortrijk: Kanaal Art Foundation, 1997. With essays by Alexander Alberro and Anthony Vidler.

• In the Place of the Public: Observations of a Frequent Flyer, Ostfildern: Cantz, 1998. With essays by Rosler and Anthony Vidler. (English)/(German)

• Martha Rosler. Positions in the Life World, ed. Catherine de Zegher, Birmingham: Ikon Gallery, and Vienna: Generali Foundation, 1999, 294 pp, IA. With interview by Benjamin H.D. Buchloh with Rosler; texts by Alexander Alberro, Sabine Breitwieser, Silvia Eiblmayr, Annette Michelson, Martha Rosler and Catherine de Zegher.
  • Martha Rosler. Positionen in der Lebenswelt, ed. & intro. Sabine Breitwieser, forew. Dietrich Karner, Vienna: Generali Foundation, and Cologne: Walther Koenig, 1999, 400 pp. [3] (German)

• Decoys and Disruptions: Selected Writings, 1975-2001, MIT Press, 2004, IA.

• Passionate Signals, ed. Sprengel Museum Hannover and Inka Schube, Ostfildern: Cantz, 2005, 288 pp. With texts by Beatrice von Bismarck and Inka Schube. [4] (English)/(German)

• Imágenes públicas: la función política de la imagen, Gustavo Gili, 2007. [5] (Spanish)

• Culture Class: Art, Creativity, Urbanism, ’s-Hertogenbosch: Hermes Lecture Foundation, 2010, 92 pp. Lecture. (English)/(Dutch)
  • "Culture Class: Art, Creativity, Urbanism, Part I-III", e-flux journal, New York: e-flux, 2010-2011.
  • Culture Class, intro. Stephen Squibb, Berlin: Sternberg Press, and New York: e-flux, 2013, 256 pp, IA. Publisher. Publisher.
  • Clase cultural: arte y gentrificación, trans. Gerardo Jorge, Buenos Aires: Caja Negra, 2017, 256 pp, IA. Publisher. (Spanish)

• Martha Rosler: Irrespective, New York: Jewish Museum, and Yale Unversity Press, 2018, 256 pp. With essays by Darsie Alexander, Rosalyn Deutsche, and Elena Volpato, and a conversation between Molly Nesbit and Martha Rosler. Exh. review: Haigney (NY Times). Publisher. Exhibition.

• La Dominación y lo cotidiano: ensayos y guiones, trans. Eduardo García Agustín and Gemma Deza Guil, Bilbao: Consonni, 2019, 224 pp. Essays and scripts in translation. Excerpt. Publisher. (Spanish)

• Martha Rosler, eds. Sebastian Baden and Luise Leyer, Berlin: Dr. Cantz'sche Verlagsgesellschaft, Jul 2023, 144 pp. Catalogue. [6] (German)/(English)

Literature

• Steve Edwards, Martha Rosler: "The Bowery in two inadequate descriptive systems", London: Afterall Books, 2012, 147 pp.

• Adair Rounthwaite, Asking the Audience: Participatory Art in 1980s New York, University of Minnesota Press, 2017, 280 pp, PDF, EPUB. On Martha Rosler's If You Lived Here... and Group Material's Democracy. Publisher. Reviews: Gosse (Panorama), Simon (ARLIS/NA), Hankins (ASAP).

Links

• Website
• Biography on EGS
• Brief biography on Tate, 2015.