Ugo Rondinone i don't live here anymore, 1999

More than 70 image motifs for i don’t live here anymore were created by the artist from 1995-1997.

Each image began with an existing fashion magazine photograph often featuring a famous model onto which the artist’s face was superimposed or photo-shopped onto the image. It was also in the 1990’s that the global launch of image editing software Adobe Photoshop took place, and these works were one of the first to use this then emerging and new technology.

The five-part suite of black and white photographs from 1998 shown here in the exhibition at Esther Schipper draws from this image pool of over 70 motifs. Rondinone up until early 2000 would continue to select images from these motifs to produce either works in color or black and white, singularly, or as suites or larger compilations and portfolios.

The images of the i don’t live here anymore series portray the artist as compelling, timeless archetypes, transformed into ambiguous idiosyncratic figures: the femme fatale dressed entirely in black; the dreamy hippie girl; the Viennese actionist-cum-seductive-androgynous-butcher; the underground music type; and, as presented here, a fetish version of Pierrot in a sculptural, Dadaist-like outfit. Altogether, the photos show an enjoyment of androgyny; the possibility to alternate identities; and the concept of gender fluidity that was made intelligible after years of emancipatory work. As the body of work exemplifies, one can shift character, if one understands how to use the tools of performativity.