So Help Me Hannah: Snatch-shots with Ray Guns

Hannah Wilke|Donald Goddard

1978 · Gelatin silver print · Photographs

Hannah Wilke was one of a number of artists in the 1960s and 1970s who began manipulating their own bodies in photographs and performances to call attention to rituals of self-presentation. Invited to exhibit in an abandoned school in Long Island City recently reopened as an art venue, Wilke posed for several hundred photographs that became backdrops for subsequent performances in the space. She referred to the series as a "performalist self-portrait with Donald Goddard," crediting the involvement of her partner, who photographed the sequence. Alternately predator and prey, Wilke took up a range of roles women are often thought to play in society.

Artist

Hannah Wilke|Donald Goddard

Date

1978

Medium

Gelatin silver print

Department

Photographs

Credit line

Purchase, The Buddy Taub Foundation Gift, Dennis A. Roach and Jill Roach, Directors, 2010