This autumn, MoMA PS1 presents the first major solo museum exhibition of painter Frieda Toranzo Jaeger (Mexican, b. 1988) in the United States. On view from 22 September 2022 to 13 March 2023, Autonomous Drive brings together more than a dozen recent works, including three new commissions. Toranzo Jaeger’s large-scale, dynamic and modular works encompass a range of materials and techniques, including ceramics and embroidery.
Image above: Frieda Toranzo Jaeger. End of Capitalism, the Future. 2022. Oil on canvas and embroidery. 104 1/2 x 82 5/8 inches (266 x 210 cm).
Toranzo Jaeger’s research into the history of painting, with a particular focus on 15th century European altarpieces, informs her multi-part works. She draws on the sculptural forms and religious symbolism of the period, which coincided with the colonial expansion of the West, and expands these references to create imaginary constructions for a post-decolonisation world that proposes a future of queer freedom, connection with nature and the creation of new spaces of joy and pleasure. For these scenes, Toranzo Jaeger examines traditional origin myths, such as that of Adam and Eve, and reshapes them to envision new beginnings. In the newly commissioned End of Capitalism, the Fountain (2022), Toranzo Jaeger depicts the bacchanal scene in Lucas Cranach’s Fountain of Youth (1546) as a post-capitalist lesbian utopia, with crashed plane parts in the background.
Toranzo Jaeger’s paintings verge on the sculptural, with multiple tableaux that merge into elaborate narrative scenes. Often hinged so that they can be shown open or closed, their multi-layered perspectives break with linear narratives. In addition, Toranzo Jaeger’s family often collaborates with her to embroider her paintings. layers onto the surface of the canvas, breaking conventions of painting by incorporating traditional techniques.
Movement and technology are essential themes found in the content and structure of Toranzo Jaeger’s works. From 15th century altarpieces to hybrid car interiors, her subjects speak of the many vehicles for the continued colonisation and control of vast territories, including outer space. In Toranzo Jaeger’s depictions, however, she imbues these vehicles with the potential of love as an antidote to colonial thinking. In this sense, Toranzo Jaeger’s work transforms spaces of technological domination by using hybridity and automation to signal ontological shifts and queer becomings that resist existing power structures.
Frieda Toranzo Jaeger lives and works in Mexico City, Mexico. Her recent solo exhibitions include The Perpetual Sense of Redness, Baltimore Museum of Art, Baltimore (2021); Fantasies of Autonomy, Arcadia Missa, London (2019); Deep Adaptation, Galerie BarbaraWeiss, Berlin (2019); The Making of Husbands: Christina Ramberg in Dialogue, Kunstwerke, Berlin (2019); Autofelatio, High Art, Paris (2018); and The Windscreen, Reena Spaulings, New York (2017). She has participated in several international group exhibitions including De Por Vida, Company Gallery, New York (2021); NGV Triennial, Melbourne (2020); Paint, also known as blood, MoMA, Warsaw (2019); City Prince/sses, Palais de Tokyo, Paris (2019); and BLISS, LAR en Escuela de la Paz, Mexico City (2018). Toranzo Jaeger’s work is included in the collections of Kadist and The Hammer Museum in Los Angeles, and she was awarded the Finkenwerder Kunstpreis 2022 in Hamburg alongside Renée Green.
Frieda Toranzo Jaeger: Autonomous Drive is organised by Ruba Katrib, Curator and Director of Curatorial Affairs, MoMA PS1.
Generous support for Frieda Toranzo Jaeger: Autonomous Drive is provided by the Deborah Buck Foundation.
Additional support is provided by Jeff Magid.
About MoMA PS1
MoMA PS1 champions art and artists at the intersection of social, cultural and political issues of our time. For more than 40 years, PS1 has offered audiences the opportunity to ask questions, access knowledge and create a forum for public debate that provides insights into artists’ diverse worldviews. Founded in 1976 by Alanna Heiss, the institution was a driving force behind the alternative space movement in New York City, transforming a 19th-century public schoolhouse in Long Island City into a space for artistic experimentation and creativity. PS1 has been a member of New York City’s Cultural Institutions Group (CIG) since 1982 and affiliated with the Museum of Modern Art since 2000.
WHEN?
Exhibition dates: Thursday, 22. September 2022 until Monday, 13. March 2023
Vernissage: Donnerstag, 22. September 2022
WHERE?
MoMA PS1
22-25 Jackson Avenue at 46th Ave in Long Island City
Queens
New York City
COST?
$10 suggested admission; $5 for students and seniors; free for New York State residents and MoMA members.
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