Margia Kramer


Margia Kramer is an American documentary visual artist, writer and activist living in New York. In the 1970s and 1980s, Kramer recontextualized primary texts in a series of pioneering, interdisciplinary multi-media installations, videotapes, self-published books, and writings that focused on feminist, civil rights, civil liberties, censorship, and surveillance issues.

Overview

Margia Kramer is an American documentary visual artist, writer and activist living in New York. In the 1970s and 1980s, Kramer recontextualized primary texts in a series of pioneering, interdisciplinary multi-media installations, videotapes, self-published books, and writings that focused on feminist, civil rights, civil liberties, censorship, and surveillance issues. Her works have been widely exhibited, including over 15 one-person shows, and over 40 group exhibitions at ; the Institute of Contemporary Arts in London ; the Museum of Modern Art ; the Whitney Museum of American Art ; Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions ; the in Brooklyn, NY ; the List Visual Arts Center of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology ; San Francisco Artspace ; P.S. 1 ; The Institute for Contemporary Art ; the Dia Art Foundation ; the American Film Institute Video Festivals; and at museums, galleries, and alternative spaces in the U.S. and abroad. Kramer's videos and installation works are in the permanent collections of the Museum of Modern Art, Allen Memorial Art Museum, New York Public Library, and in the private collection of Albert and Vera List, among other private and public collections.
In the 1970s and 1980s, using the United States' Freedom of Information Act, Kramer sourced and requested, from the United States Federal Bureau of Investigation and Central Intelligence Agency, specific documents and dossiers. Kramer presented these original FBI and CIA documents to the public in her art works, exactly as they were released to her, including redactions, and unchanged in text and format. To underscore the inherent repressiveness of the official government documents' deletions and redactions, Kramer's creative process included enlarging or reducing their scale, shifting their positive/negative ratios, and changing the materials upon which they were printed from paper to transparent film. Kramer transformed the hieratic, primary materials into installations of giant negative photostats on transparent film that were suspended on threads from ceilings to cast shadows on surrounding walls. The large scale, hanging black rectangles and trenchant white to black positive/negative forms where redactions and texts became transparent, combined to create a chilling but compelling atmosphere that was simultaneously oppressive and informative.
By making art that highlighted the specific contents of the documents she received, Kramer was able to demonstrate their undercover strategies, as well as their negative emotional and material impact on the lives of United States citizens protected by the United States Constitution's Bill of Rights. These works centered on issues around feminism, censorship, civil liberties, and civil rights, all in the context of government surveillance. In particular, Kramer made a series of videos, documentary books, and installations on subjects of state counterintelligence programs including the actress Jean Seberg, and the artist, filmmaker, and impresario/provocateur Andy Warhol.

Photographs of major works

WINDOW INSTALLATION, "Secret III," 1980, Printed Matter Bookstore, Lispenard Street, NYC. Pages from Jean Seberg's FBI File received by the artist from the FBI using the Freedom of Information Act. Enlarged pages from the file printed on transparent film, plus a self-published pamphlet with an introduction by the artist and including more facsimile pages from the File. Photograph by Margia Kramer.

Video Installation with multi-media. Enlarged negative photostats on transparent film of facsimiles of 4 pages from the FBI File on Jean Seberg and a New York Times Article, "Rehnquist To Hear Black Panther Case," 20 minute videotape "Freedom of Information Tape 1, Jean Seberg" by Margia Kramer. "Jean Seberg/The FBI/The Media," a pamphlet by Margia Kramer. Approximately 12" x 12." In the exhibition, "Issue: Social Strategies by Women Artists,"Institute of Contemporary Art, London. Photograph by Margia Kramer.

Facsimiles of pages from the FBI File on Jean Seberg included copies of pages from relevant magazine and newspaper articles, an original 20 minute videotape "Freedom of Information Tape 1, Jean Seberg" by Margia Kramer, an original handbook, "Jean Seberg/The FBI/The Media" by Margia Kramer, enlarged negative photostats on transparent film of file pages, and positive photostats on paper of relevant magazine and newspaper articles. Approx. 25' x 25' The exhibition encompassed a Jean Seberg Film Festival held at the Donnell Library and Carnegie Hall Cinema, a special screening of Seberg as "St. Joan" at MOMA, and a panel discussion "Freedom of Information and the Arts," moderated by Margia Kramer, at the Donnell Library. Photograph by the Margia Kramer.

"Address Book Triptych". Multi-media triptych. Enlarged negative photostats on transparent film of facsimiles of declassified, redacted pages of opponents of the Vietnam War. From the FBI files requested by the artist using the Freedom of Act. Teak frames with Plexiglas, 22" x 51". Photograph by Margia Kramer.
"CIA Screen". Multi-media four-panel folding screen. Enlarged negative photostats on transparent film of facsimile of a 4-page recruitment brochure published by the Central Intelligence Agency for its Clandestine Service. Teak frames with Plexiglas, 72" x 80". In the exhibition "Democracy and Politics," curated by Group Material at the Dia Art Foundation, New York. Photograph by the Margia Kramer.

"Looking At Militarism". Multi-media installation with film and video. Enlarged negative photostats on transparent film, with teak frames, of facsimiles of documents from MIT archives, government defense programs, war and peace initiatives, budget priorities, newspaper articles, and other relevant documents. Archival film footage from Hiroshima and Nagasaki showing the effects of nuclear war. Original video interviews by the artist on the subject of peace activism with MIT Professors Vera Kistiakowsky and Noam Chomsky. Approximately 40' x 50'. List Visual Arts Center, Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Photograph by Margia Kramer.

"I a WO/MAN: The FBI File on Andy Warhol". Mixed media installation. Enlarged negative photostats on transparent film, with redwood frames, of facsimiles of redacted pages from Andy Warhol's FBI File — using the Freedom of Information Act, the artist requested that the file be declassified following Warhol's death. The large photostats were hung from the ceiling over 30' long, horizontal platform that concealed all but the screens of video monitors pointed towards the ceiling, continuously playing three, commercially released Warhol/Morrisey films: Flesh, Trash, and Heat. Pamphlet by Margia Kramer, "Andy Warhol et al. The FBI File on Andy Warhol". Approximately 25' x 40'. San Francisco Artspace. Includes "The Warhol File," by Margia Kramer from The Village Voice, May 1988. Photograph by Bonnie Burt.

Affiliations

Kramer was among the founding members of Political Art Documentation/Distribution, and was a member of the editorial board of its magazine, Upfront, to which she contributed two articles. PAD/D's archive is now housed in the library of the Museum of Modern Art in New York City.

Videography

PUBLICATIONS by Margia Kramer
OTHER ORIGINAL WRITINGS
ONE-PERSON EXHIBITIONS:
GROUP EXHIBITIONS: