Carey Young (born 1970) is a visual artist whose work uses a variety of media including video, photography, text and installation. Her work often examines and questions the reach of the legal and commercial spheres and their ability to shape contemporary reality. Since 2017, she has created two films featuring female judges in order to examine the interrelationships of law, fiction and gender. Young teaches at the Slade School of Fine Art in London where she is a Professor in Fine Art.[1]
Young's projects often centre on ideas of the body, language, rhetoric, and systems of power. In her early video works, she wore attire appropriate to the business worlds, enacting often-ironic scenarios which examine and question its power to shape society and individual identity.[citation needed]
Since 2002, her work has shifted into an interest in law and the legal imagination, and was the first to develop the idea of using law as an artistic medium. 'Disclaimer', a 2003 exhibition at the Henry Moore Institute[14] examined legal disclaimers as a form of negative space. In 2005, she showed 'Consideration', a series of works exploring the connections between contract law and performance art at Paula Cooper Gallery in New York as part of the PERFORMA05 Biennial.[15]RoseLee Goldberg described the works in this show as "dealing with the overwhelming power of the law."[16] This is seen again in Declared Void (2005), which explores the relationship between the law and the constitutional rights of individuals.
Her 2013 exhibition "Legal Fictions" at Migros Museum in Zurich was described by Mousse Magazine as featuring:
"law-based works [that] address the monolithic power of the legal system. The artist examines law as a conceptual and abstract space in which power, rights, and authority are played out through varying forms of performance and language. With the drafting assistance of legal advisers, her works often take the form of experimental but functional legal instruments such as contracts, and also employ media such as video, installation, and text."[17]
Her 2017 video installation Palais de Justice,[18] at Paula Cooper Gallery was described by critic Jeffrey Kastner as: “quietly stunning … vividly proposes a juridical world as it might otherwise be, a form of the Law that may someday be possible.”[19] Johanna Fateman, Artforum, described the work as: "a transfixing (...) speculative fiction", a "tantalising (...) novel mockup of a post-patriarchal legal system."[20]
Laura Cumming, of The Observer, said "Young’s profound and involving examination of the law has continued through film, photography and installation art for more than 20 years. (...) The laws that govern our rights, our agency and even our movements in this world are, for Young, 'a form of choreography'."[21]
2017 Palais de Justice, Paula Cooper Gallery, New York; The New Architecture, Dallas Museum of Art, Dallas
2013 Legal Fictions, Migros Museum für Gegenwartskunst, Zurich; Let the World Speak for Itself, Le Quartier Centre d'Art Contemporain, Quimper
2010 Memento Park, Eastside Projects, Birmingham (and tour to Cornerhouse, Manchester and MiMA, Middlesbrough); Contracting Universe, Paula Cooper Gallery, New York
2009 Carey Young: Uncertain Contracts, Museum of Art, Rhode Island School of Design, Providence; Speech Acts, Contemporary Art Museum, St Louis; Counter Offer, The Power Plant, Toronto
2008 Mutual Release, Thomas Dane, London
2007 If/Then, Paula Cooper Gallery, New York; Speechcraft, Modern Art Oxford, Oxford (performance); Consideration, Midway Contemporary Art, Minneapolis
2006 Image Transfer, Umea Art Academy, Umea, curated by Maria Lind
2005 Consideration, Paula Cooper Gallery, New York (part of Performa05 Biennial); The Representative, solo presentation, IBID Projects booth, Zoo Art Fair, London; Disclaimer, IBID Projects, London; Carey Young, Trafo Gallery, Budapest.
2004 Disclaimer, Henry Moore Institute, Leeds; Participant Observer, participative workshop on art and economics, IASPIS, Stockholm; Carey Young, Index, Stockholm; Viral Marketing, (The Revolution is Us! & Getting Things Done When You're Not in Charge), Kunstverein München
2003 Optimum Performance, A Short History of Performance - Part II, Whitechapel Gallery, London; Carey Young, IBID Projects, Vilnius; Viral Marketing, Kunstverein Munich;
2001 - 2002 Business as Usual, John Hansard Gallery, Southampton, Angel Row, Nottingham; Firstsite, Colchester (curated and organised by Film & Video Umbrella)
2001 My Megastore, site-specific works at Virgin Megastore, London; Carey Young, Video Project Space, Wilkinson Gallery, London
2000 Nothing Ventured, fig-1, London (exh. cat.)
Other publications
Young's work has been included in numerous publications and a number of videos and audio recordings.[24]
Selected periodicals
Cumming, Laura, 'Carey Young: Appearance review – the faces of female justice', The Observer, 26 March 2023
Fateman, Johanna, "Carey Young at Paula Cooper", Artforum, Nov 2017
Farago, Jason, 'Palais de Justice', New York Times, 20 Sept 2017
Bryan-Wilson, Julia. 'Inside Job: Julia Bryan-Wilson on the art of Carey Young,' Artforum, Oct 2010
Bell, Natalie, 'Carey Young', Art Papers, March/April 2008
Smith, Roberta, "The Passions of the Good Citizen", The New York Times, 3 May 2002
Web articles
Kastner, Jeffrey, Garage magazine (Vice magazine), Oct 2017[25]
Bourbon, Matthew, 'Critic's Pick: Carey Young at Dallas Museum of Art', Artforum.com, Feb 2017[26]
Shore, Robert, and Young, Carey, 'Interview with Carey Young: “Friendly, Honest, Straightforward”: Meditations on Power', Elephant magazine, Feb 2017 [27]
Goldberg, RoseLee and Stallman, Nick, "Conversations..with RoseLee Goldberg', New York Foundation for the Arts, 2005[28]
Baker, R.C., 'The Road to Dystopia', Village Voice, 2007[29]
Books
Buskirk, Martha; Gygax, Raphael; Young, Carey and Zolghadr, Tirdad, in 'Carey Young: Subject to Contract', JRP Ringier and Migros Museum of Contemporary Art, Zurich, London, 2013
Farquharson, Alex; Gillick, Liam and Young, Carey; Kelsey, John and Millar, Jeremy, in 'Carey Young, Incorporated', John Hansard Gallery and Film & Video Umbrella, London, 2002
Nochlin, Linda, in Global Feminisms, Brooklyn Museum, New York, 2007
Bourriaud, Nicolas, in Moscow Biennale 7 catalogue, Moscow, 2007
Hoffman, Jens in 'Institutional Critique and After', edited by John C. Welchman, JRP/Ringier, Zürich, 2006
Newman, Michael, in 'How to Improve the World', Hayward Gallery, London, 2006
Townsend, Chris, 'New Art from London', Thames and Hudson, London, 2006
Farquharson, Alex, Schlieker, Andrea, and Mahony, Emma in 'British Art Show 6', Hayward Gallery Publishing, London, 2005
Latour, Bruno and Weibel, Peter, 'Making Things Public', ZKM and the MIT Press, Karlsruhe & Cambridge, 2005
Hoffmann, Jens and Jonas, Joan, 'Art Works: Perform', Thames and Hudson, London, 2005
Kimbell, Lucy (ed), 'New Media Art: Practice and Content in the UK 1994–2004', Arts Council of England / Cornerhouse publications, London, 2004
Videos about the artist
Artist's website (video interview with the artist about her recent works, Jan 2024, duration 4 mins 20 secs)
Centre Pompidou (Artist talk in English, with French translation,17 May 2010; duration 1hr 51 mins)
