This work by Joseph Bartscherer displays in chronological order every issue of The New York Times since January 1, 1990 that carries a front-page obituary. It will continue its inexorable growth as additional figures in the arts, sciences, politics and commerce join such personages as Audrey Hepburn, Tip O'Neill, Cesar Chavez, Kurt Cobain, Mother Teresa, Jackie Onassis and hundreds of others.

Deceptively simple and unmediated, this work raises deeply provocative questions: What role does the most influential newspaper in the U.S. play in the formation and recording of contemporary history? What constitutes celebrity and what do criteria for fame reveal about national values? What are the political agendas of the reporters and editorial boards who define what is significant? What are the uses of photography and narrative and what are the effects of their juxtapositions, both intentional and accidental?

Serving as a summation of the last decade of the second millennium, this sculpture elegantly raises fundamental questions about where and who we are as a culture. At the same time, Obituary provides a synopsis and critique of 20th-century avant-garde artistic movements, from Dada to Pop, with references to minimalism and conceptual art. Although he does not claim to be a postmodernist, Bartscherer uses the postmodern device of appropriating cultural objects to activate ideas and emotions. Through this gesture he raises one of the central questions of aesthetics: where is the work of art located, in the specific properties of the object, or in the reverberations it creates in the viewer's consciousness? As does the best art of every age, Obituary forces us to recognize that the answer is not as simple and straightforward as we had hoped.

Lucy Flint-Gohlke, Curator