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Why is Nan Goldin famous?
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Nan Goldin is famous for her work as a photographer. She was particularly drawn to the avant-garde music scene in Manhattan in the late 1970s and early ’80s, and “The Ballad of Sexual Dependency” series would include many photos taken in her newly adopted city. Goldin first exhibited the series at the Whitney Biennial in 1985 before publishing it as a book a year later. In its startling honesty, Goldin’s gripping portraits captured sexual relationships, drug use, intimate scenes in the homes of families, partying at bars, domestic violence and the AIDS-related horrors faced by those in the era’s LGBTQ+ community. Over the years, Goldin has collaborated with Japanese photographer Nobuyoshi Araki and completed projects for Jimmy Choo and Bottega Veneta. While her work has broadened to include New York City skylines, portraiture and commercial fashion photography, her commitment to documentary-style honesty has never wavered. In 2006, as part of Goldin’s "Chasing a Ghost” exhibition in New York City, a presentation was projected on three screens involving videos, photography and a musical collage focused on her older sister, Barbara, who took her own life in 1965. Among Goldin’s many accolades are her admission to the French Legion of Honor in 2006, the Hasselblad Foundation International Award in 2007 and the Lucie Award in 2014. Shop a range of Nan Goldin art on 1stDibs.
1stDibs ExpertJanuary 10, 2025
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Shop for Nan Goldin Art on 1stDibs
Lydia Lunch at the Russian Baths, 268 East 10th Street, 1985 offset litho poster
By Nan Goldin
Located in New York, NY
Nan Goldin
Lydia Lunch at the Russian Baths, 268 East 10th Street, 1985 poster, 2018
Offset lithograph poster (unsigned, unnumbered and unframed)
17 × 22 inches
Published by The Kitchen in 2018, on the occasion of their Gala honoring Nan Goldin and Lydia Lunch
Provenance
Acquired from The Kitchen on the occasion of their 2018 Gala
Also accompanied by Certificate of Guarantee from Alpha 137 Gallery
Excerpt from The Kitchen description of this event:
“During the late ‘80s and early ‘90s, icons Goldin and Lunch were vanguards of post-punk New York. Both women have presented their work at The Kitchen throughout the years, consistently returning to premiere new works that went on to exemplify their careers. Goldin’s portraiture of her close-knit circle of friends in New York became emblematic of her generation’s grappling with the social issues of the time, from the epidemic of drug addiction to the AIDS crisis. Lunch is revered as a radical progenitor of No Wave music, fronting the influential Teenage Jesus and the Jerks and collaborating with acts like JG Thirlwell, Birthday Party, and Sonic Youth. Lunch has a broad artistic practice, also working in film, visual art, writing, and spoken-word. Goldin and Lunch have also collaborated on numerous occasions. For instance, the cover of Lunch’s 1995 album Drowning In Limbo featured a portrait of her taken by Goldin. Lunch also posed for Goldin’s project for The Village Voice’s short-lived fashion insert Vue in 1985. Shot as part of an editorial called “Masculine/Feminine,” the image of a reclining Lunch at Russian baths in the East Village was ultimately not included in the final layout, and we were pleased to be present the image for the first time as a limited-edition print in support of The Kitchen.
At The Kitchen in November 1980, Goldin presented slides as part of Dubbed in Glamour, a three-day event of “spectacle and extravagance” organized by Edit deAk that featured primarily women artists. Introduced by Cookie Mueller, who served as the master of ceremonies, these slides were an early version of Goldin’s landmark work The Ballad of Sexual Dependency, which continued to take shape during the next few years. The Bush Tetras, who performed at this year’s gala, also participated in Dubbed in Glamour.
In 1994, Goldin returned to The Kitchen to premiere three slideshows for the first time in the United States as part of the winter lecture series curated by Ira Silverberg. The first slideshow developed from her 1992 award-winning book The Other Side, which lauded the drag queens she lived with and among in New York. During the ‘70s, when Goldin first moved to the city, the people she lived with became not just her subjects, but also her chosen family. The second slideshow was a series of intimate self-portraits. The evening concluded with a collection of Goldin’s images that traced her relationships to her close friends Alf Bold, Gilles Dusein, and Cookie Mueller and celebrated the joy of their lives and the pain of their deaths from AIDS.
In 1985, Lunch first appeared at The Kitchen as part of the two-night screening series of experimental short films, Super 8 Motel. She and Richard Kern...
Category
2010s Contemporary Figurative Prints
Materials
Lithograph, Offset
Swan-Like Embrace (Paris) by Nan Goldin
By Nan Goldin
Located in London, GB
By Nan Goldin
Swan-Like Embrace, Paris (2001), printed later, 2021
C-Print on paper
8 x 5 1/8 inches
Signed verso (please see image 3)
From the 2021 timed release, published by Pain.
Category
2010s Contemporary Figurative Photography
Materials
C Print
Swan Like Embrace, Paris
By Nan Goldin
Located in London, GB
Swan-Like Embrace, Paris 2001, printed later, 2021
C-Print on paper
8 x 5 1/8 inches
Signed on the back
published by Pain
Nan Goldin's "Swan-like Embrace, Paris, 2001" is a poignant...
Category
2010s Contemporary Figurative Prints
Materials
C Print
Joey with Her New Breasts (NYC)
By Nan Goldin
Located in Toronto, Ontario
Nan Goldin (b. 1953) is one of the most influential photographers of the 20th century. Beginning in the 1970's Goldin took candid shots of her lovers and friends - especially drag queens and trans women, characters often living on the margins of society, in New York City and beyond.
"Cody in the Dressing Room at the Boy Bar, NYC” is a paradigm of Goldin's work from the early 1990’s celebrating both nightlife and its beautiful denizens.
The photograph shows Cody, semi-nude and confidently posing for Goldin, as they either unwind after or are preparing for a performance. Situated in a dressing room signalled by the mirror, makeup and clothes strewn around. Behind Cody is a silver grid of black and white portraits taped to the wall, reminiscent of Warhol’s famous screen tests, and a reminder of Goldin's exceptional composition. Furthermore, the image is cropped right above the subject's waist leaving their actual gender ambiguous if not irrelevant.
Today, images of drag queens and glamorous trans woman are increasingly common in Western culture, considering the success of TV shows such as Rupaul's Drag Race...
Category
1990s Contemporary Nude Photography
Materials
Dye Transfer
Supreme Nan Goldin skateboard deck (Nan as a Dominatrix)
By Nan Goldin
Located in NEW YORK, NY
Nan Goldin Supreme Skateboard Deck: 'Nan as a Dominatrix, Cambridge MA' (1978/2018):
Published in 2018 by Supreme New York
Features Nan Goldin printed signature on verso
From a sold...
Category
21st Century and Contemporary Feminist Nude Photography
Materials
Wood, Offset
My hotel room, Valencia, Spain
By Nan Goldin
Located in Toronto, Ontario
Nan Goldin (b. 1953) is unquestionably one of the most influential photographers of the 20th century. A successor to Diane Arbus and William Egglestone, her aesthetic and creative ap...
Category
1980s Contemporary Color Photography
Materials
C Print