Painting on Plato’s Wall

The shadows behind people walking
in the bright piazza are not merely
gaps in the sunlight. Just as goodness
is not the absence of badness.
Goodness is a triumph. And so it is
with love. Love is not the part
we are born with that flowers
a little and then wanes as we
grow up. We cobble love together
from this and those of our machinery
until there is suddenly an apparition
that never existed before. There it is,
unaccountable. The woman and our
desire are somehow turned into
brandy by Athena’s tiny owl filling
the darkness around an old villa
on the mountain with its plaintive
mewing. As a man might be
turned into someone else while
living kind of happy up there
with the lady’s gentle dying.

–Jack Gilbert

CHRIS BURDEN
Samson
1985
Turnstile, winch, worm gear, leather strap, jack, timbers, steel, steel plates
Dimensions variable

A museum installation consisting of a 100-ton jack connected to a gear box and a turnstile. The 100-ton jack pushes two large timbers against the bearing walls of the museum. Each visitor to the museum must pass through the turnstile in order to see the exhibition. Each input on the turnstile ever so slightly expands the jack, and ultimately if enough people visit the exhibition, SAMSON could theoretically destroy the building. Like a glacier, its powerful movement is imperceptible to the naked eye. This sculptural installation subverts the notion of the sanctity of the Museum (the shed that houses the art).

Nan Goldin
Nan at the Hospital, Berlin,
1984/1999
Cibachrome, 76.2 x 101.6 cm
Collection Fotomuseum Winterthur, gift Andreas Reinhart
Inv. no. 1999-008-007
© Nan Goldin

Nan Goldin
Self-portrait with Brian having sex, NYC, 
1983/1999
Cibachrome
Collection Fotomuseum Winterthur, gift Andreas Reinhart
Inv. no. 1999-008-005
© Nan Goldin

Nan Goldin
Self-portrait in bed, NYC,
1981/1999
Cibachrome, 76.2 x 101.6 cm
Collection Fotomuseum Winterthur, gift Andreas Reinhart
Inv. no. 1999-008-002
© Nan Goldin

Nan Goldin
Sunset over Naples bay from Mt. Vesuvius, Italy,
1997
Cibachrome, 50.8 x 60.9 cm
Collection Fotomuseum Winterthur
Inv. no. 1998-031-009
© Nan Goldin

Nan Goldin
Nan Crying in Bathroom, Baltimore MD,
1986/1999
Cibachrome, 76 x 102 cm
Collection Fotomuseum Winterthur, gift Andreas Reinhart
Inv. no. 1999-008-010
© Nan Goldin

Nan Goldin
Self-Portrait with Eyes Turned Inward, Boston,
1989/1999
Cibachrome, 76 x 102 cm
Collection Fotomuseum Winterthur, gift Andreas Reinhart
Inv. no. 1999-008-015
© Nan Goldin