SELECTED EXHIBITIONS
Charaxes angusta (cibratus?), 1999, photogravure, image size: 11 x 14 inches, paper size: 19-1/2 x 22 inches.
PHOTOGRAPHY & THE SPECIMEN
January 11 - March 23, 2025
MILLS COLLEGE ART MUSEUM, Oakland, California
Presented as part of Photography & The Specimen, an exhibition featuring a selection of photographs from the museum’s collection that explored various modes of the photographic specimen and how they function as forms of knowledge. “Photographs, like natural specimens, preserve what is lost—to death, to extinction, to exile. Considering natural history museums' reliance on death to represent life, Susan Magnus strips museum butterfly specimens of their lifelike illusion by printing her photographs in funereal blacks.” Photography & The Specimen was curated by Dr. Sarah Miller, Associate Adjunct Professor of Art History, and supported by the Bourne Special Gallery Projects Endowment.
Imageafter, 2024, installation view, Garrison Art Center, Garrison, New York. Photo credit: Ernesto Eisner.
SUSAN MAGNUS: IMAGEAFTER
September 21 - October 27, 2024
Garrison Art Center, Garrison, New York
The work in Imageafter draws on an inherited, multi-generational archive of family photographs, film negatives, and personal artifacts. Engaging with these materials, Magnus repurposes and reconfigures them into photo-based projects, sculptures, and mixed-media works that explore themes of ephemerality, identity formation, and the instability of memory.
The Architecture of Memory, 2013, synthetic polymer paint on 4 x 6-inch machine c-prints, installation dimensions variable.
FIRST EDITION SHOWCASE
January 12 - January 27, 2013
Jen Bekman Gallery, New York, New York
“Repurposing 4 x 6 inch snapshots of people and places she has accumulated, Susan Magnus paints over and distorts these often already-blurry, awkwardly composed photos to create installations that question the symbolic aspects of material culture and reflect the unreliable nature of photography and memory.” Exhibition juror: Penelope Umbrico. Installation view, Jen Bekman Gallery, New York, New York.
Trace, 2012, tracing paper, tape. Installation view, Howland Cultural Center, Beacon, New York.
SOME GIRLS
March 3 - March 31, 20212
Howland Cultural Center, Beacon, New York
This project responds to the history and architecture of the former Howland Library in Beacon, New York. Designed in 1872 by Richard Morris Hunt, the building served as the city’s public library until 1976, when the book collection was relocated. In Trace, effigies of the books were made from tracing paper and arranged on the remaining bookshelves.
Threshold, 2007, metalized polyester, dimensions variable. Installation view, Samuel Dorsky Museum of Art, New Paltz, NY. Photo credit: Bob Wagner.
THE UNCANNY VALLEY
June 23 - September 9, 2007
Samuel Dorsky Museum of Art, State University of New York, New Paltz, New York
Presented as part of The Uncanny Valley at the Samuel Dorsky Museum of Art, Threshold is an institutional-scale curtain wall of reflective material that mirrors the entire room and responds to unpredictable air currents and visitor interactions.
Lifetime, ongoing, National Geographic magazines, steel, 7 x 10 x depth increases with yearly installments. Collection Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive, purchase made possible by a gift from the Wallace Alexander Gerbode Foundation. Installation view, Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive. Photo taken in 2003 by Sibila Savage.
TURNING CORNERS
February 26, 2003 - January 22, 2006
Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive, University of California, Berkeley, California
Lifetime is an ongoing project comprising my lifelong subscription to National Geographic magazine. Each year, twelve additional issues are provided to the museum, marking the passage of time and increasing the size of the work over the course of my life.
Folly, 2005; wood, cardboard boxes, mailing labels, tape, dimensions variable. Installation view, private residence, Hudson, New York.
MERIT BADGE
July 23 - September 3, 2005
Private Residence, Hudson, New York
In Folly, shipping boxes are repurposed to create an avian metropolis designed to deteriorate over time. The work was featured in Merit Badge, an exhibition organized by Jason Middlebrook.
SUSAN MAGNUS: EX NATURA
November 3, 2—3 - December 3, 1994
Rena Bransten Gallery, San Francisco, CA