Jenny (Bed), 2009
Jenny, 2009
Artifacts | Catherine Opie’s ‘Girlfriends’ By LINDA YABLONSKY | MARCH 19, 2010, 2:46 PM
Catherine Opie knows women. Self-possessed, gender-defying women who favor piercings and tattoos, and run in her butch-lesbian-bondage crowd in Los Angeles. The kind of women who attract stares and sometimes abuse. Their hair-raising, Hans Holbein-inspired portraits in Opie’s breakout appearance at the 1995 Whitney Biennial, when “identity politics” were at their height, gave her a notoriety that sent her in pursuit of less polarizing subjects: surfers, California freeways, city skylines, grand western landscapes and even high school football players.
Now, two years after her retrospective at the Guggenheim Museum, Opie has returned to her community roots with “Girlfriends,” a knockout show of new and never-before-seen portraits at the Gladstone Gallery. Shot in her studio during formal sittings or more casually either outdoors or at home, they include some of her past subjects as they are now, even more tattooed, transgendered – and in the case of the bare-chested Pig Pen and Alexa – riveting. There are some familiar faces as well: “The L Word” star Kate Moenning blowing a perfect smoke ring, a serious k.d. lang, a leathered-up Jenny Shimizu astride her Ducati and, in another photo, coming on from her bed. These girls sure don’t cry. They owe nothing to nobody. They are who they are. If it’s an underground they represent, it’s getting a lot of fresh air in this blue-chip gallery.
The show also includes small black-and-white portraits from the early ’90s, pictures of boyish babes that Opie made as a freshman documentarian and has since been keeping to herself. They are by turns innocent, playful and frightening. All together, “Girlfriends” shows Opie continuing to explore the hidden territories behind constructed facades. Looking at her pictures can be uncomfortable, not because of their confrontational content but because they reveal as much about the beholder as the beheld.
“Girlfriends” is on view until April 24 at Gladstone Gallery, 515 West 24th Street.
Purple Fashion magazine #13 Spring Summer 2010
#4 purple FASHION WOMEN
70 Portraits, shot by 9 Photographers, in 5 cities.
L: Lindsay Lohan by Terry Richardon, R: Jenny Shimizu by Ari Marcopoulos
Jenny Shimizu – New York, New York.
“Clearly, Purple Style is always personal. We don’t photograph people to celebrate (and to sell) fashion. On the contrary we shoot creative fashion to celebrate creative people to show them at their best. Beyond that, we’re convinced that fashion isn’t interesting if interesting people don’t wear it, glamorize it, and enjoy it — season after season.
— Olivier Zahm, Editor-in-Chief/Creative Director, Purple Fashion magazine
Jenny Shimizu can now add designer to her list with the launch of her t-shirt line coming Spring 2010. The collection will include 3 designs, crafted with down-to-the-smallest-detail attention.
Hint: Motorcyles, Playboy and a 90’s Supermodel.
They will be available for purchase on her official website. Check back for updates!
Q: What makes you a motorcycle enthusiast?
Jenny: “i was born with the obsession for anything with a motor. i would pop open the hood of my dad’s volkswagen and pretend i was working on it when i was around 6 years old. all my cousins had yamaha or husquavarna enduros and they would take me on rides. i was too small to ride myself and i would feel like i was in heaven. i would fall asleep alot while holding onto them, cruising the trails up in northern california. once i was 10 my dad got forced into giving me and my sister 2 minibikes that my uncle made him take. that started the obsession with having my own bike and instantaneously started my rebel attitude. i often got pulled over by cops for riding my minibike on the public roads heading to the local circle k for candy. i also started taking my minibike apart because i wanted it to go faster. been along time since those days, 8 bikes later and many fractured and broken bones, i still ride. i can’t stop.”
Jenny and her Yamaha. Age 11. Summer of '78
Jenny Shimizu Online 