Mira Schor (born June 1, 1950) is an American artist, writer, editor, and educator, known for her contributions to critical discourse on the status of paintingincontemporary art and culture as well as to feminist art history and criticism.
Schor’s visual work balances political and theoretical concerns with formalist and material passions. Her work has included major periods in which gendered narrative and representation of the body has been featured, but the predominant focus of her work has been representation of language in drawing and painting. Her paintings have been foregrounded by these various disciplines: by painting, with shows such as "Slow Art: Painting in New York Now," at P.S.1 Contemporary Art Center; by feminism, with exhibitions such as "Sexual Politics: Judy Chicago's 'Dinner Party' in Feminist Art History," at the Armand Hammer Museum; and by language, with shows such as "Poetry Plastique," at Marianne Boesky Gallery in New York. In 1969, Yvonne Jacquette lent her a book of Rajput painting and poetry, which she claimed had a "huge, huge influence" on her.[2]
In the 1980s and 90s, Schor's work was also exhibited in New York at the Edward Thorp Gallery, Horodner Romley Gallery, and in group exhibitions including at the Santa Monica Museum, the Armand Hammer Museum, The Neuberger Museum, and the Aldrich Museum. Her visual work and her writings are included in Art and Feminism (2001) and Sexual Politics: Judy Chicago’s Dinner Party in Feminist Art History (1996). In 2009 Schor exhibited her work at Momenta ArtinWilliamsburg, Brooklyn, in a solo exhibition entitled "Suddenly," marking a departure in Schor's work, from the depiction of language as image to the suggestion of its lack in a space where we expect to see it. A solo exhibition, "Mira Schor: Paintings From the Nineties To Now," was held at CB1 Gallery in Los Angeles, CA (November 20, 2010 – January 9, 2011) with a catalogue essay by art historian Amelia Jones. Schor exhibited her work at Marvelli Gallery [1] in 2012. In 2009 painter and critic Robert Berlind wrote, "An intimist whose candor is akin to Emily Dickinson’s.".[3] In a 2012 New York Times review, critic Roberta Smith wrote『Mira Schor’s small, sharp, quirky paintings have been thorns in the side of the medium for more than three decades now』and "Ms. Schor hardly tells the whole story of creative labor, but she lays out its essential elements: the isolation, reading, thinking and percolation that enable a Voice to emerge. At once poetic, lyrical and oddly real, her paintings give rare and sardonic visual form to the life, and the work, of the mind".[4] Reviews of Schor's recent exhibitions have been published in Art in America[5] and on Artforum.com.
Schor is the co-founder and co-editor, with Susan Bee, of the art journal, M/E/A/N/I/N/G. M/E/A/N/I/N/G: An Anthology of Artists' Writings, Theory, and Criticism, was published by Duke University Press in 2000. The archive of the journal was acquired by the Beinecke Library at Yale University in 2007.[6] This respected artist-run editorial project continues at M/E/A/N/I/NG Online
Schor has written frequently on issues of gender representation, including "Backlash and Appropriation," a chapter of The Power of Feminist Art, 1994, an historical overview of the Feminist movement published by Abrams, "Patrilineage", 2002, republished in The Feminism and Visual Culture Reader edited by Amelia Jones, and on artists such as Ida Applebroog, Mary Kelly, and Ana Mendieta. Schor is the author of Wet: On Painting, Feminism, and Art Culture, 1997, and co-founder and co-editor, with Susan Bee, of M/E/A/N/I/N/G publishing 20 issues from 1986-1996. An online version of the journal, M/E/A/N/I/NG Online was launched in 2000 (the final issue, no. 7 was published in 2016).[7]M/E/A/N/I/N/GAn Anthology of Artists’ Writings, Theory, and Criticism, was published by Duke University Press in 2000.[8] Schor has sometimes been criticized for taking an essentialist position in terms of feminism and many of her writings take on this debate. In her writings on paintings in essays such as "Figure/Ground," 2001, Schor is seen as making a case for the relevance of painting in a post-medium visual culture and for arguing for the compatibility and mutuality of painterly and theoretical practices.
In 2003, Schor produced a video documentary on her parents’ work, The Tale of the Goldsmith’s Floor, originally created for the 2003 Brown University and differences conference, "The Lure of the Detail"[9]
"Backlash and Appropriation" in The Power of Feminist Art, Norma Broude & Mary Garrard, eds, Abrams, 1994
"Patrilineage," Feminist Art Criticism issue, Art Journal 50, No. 2 Summer 1991. Anthologized in New Feminist Criticism: Art/Identity/Action, HarperCollins, 1994 and The Feminism and Visual Culture Reader, Routledge, 2003; Translated into Czech, Neviditelná zena, Antologie soucasneho americkeko mysleni o feminismu, dejinach a vizualite, Martina Pachmanova, ed., One Woman Press, Prague, 2002.
"Figure/Ground," M/E/A/N/I/N/G #6, reprinted in Wet & M/E/A/N/I/N/G: An Anthology, excerpted in Helen Reckitt & Peggy Phelan, Art and Feminism, London & New York: Phaidon Press Ltd., 2001.
"Medusa Redux: Ida Applebroog and the Spaces of Postmodernity," Artforum, March. Updated and published as catalogue essay for Ida Applebroog, Orchard Gallery, Derry, Northern Ireland, 1993; excerpts included in Ida Applebroog, Are You Bleeding Yet?, New York: La Maison Red, 2002.
"On Failure and Anonymity," Heresies 25, 1990.
"Appropriated Sexuality," M/E/A/N/I/N/G #1, 1986. Anthologized in Theories of Contemporary Art, Richard Hertz, ed. (Prentice Hall, 1985), and republished in Wet and M/E/A/N/I/N/G: An Anthology of Artists' Writings, Theory, and Criticism.
Drucker, Johanna. Sweet Dreams: Contemporary Art and Complicity, UChicago Press, 2006. 124-8, color plate 6.
Jones, Amelia. Sexual Politics. UCLA at the Armand Hammer of Art and Cultural Center, UC Press, 2003.
Drucker, Johanna. The Century of Artists' Books, Granary Books, 1995.
Duncan, Michael. "Reviews," Art in America, April 1994.
Canning, Sue. "Reviews," Art Papers, Volume 18, no. 1, January & February 1994.
Humphrey, David. "New York FAX," Art Issues, no. 31, January/February 1994.
Phelan, Peggy. "Developing the Negative: Mapplethorpe, Schor, and Sherman" chapter of Unmarked, Routledge, 1993.
Larson, Kay. "The Painting Pyramid," New York Magazine, May 25, 1992.
Morgan, Robert C. "After The Deluge: The Return of the Inner Directed Artist," Arts Magazine, March, 1992. Reprinted with reproduction in After the Deluge: Essays for Art in the Nineties. New York: Red Bass, 1993.
