Taryn Simon: Contraband by Hans Ulrich Obrist

by Taryn Simon

Taryn Simon lived in John F Kennedy International Airport from November 16 through November 20, 2009. JFK processes more international passengers than any other airport in the United States. Contraband includes photographs taken 24 hours a day of over 1000 items detained or seized from passengers and express mail entering the U.S. from abroad. Over five days, in both the U.S. Customs and Border Protection Federal Inspection Site and the U.S. Postal Service International Mail Facility, Simon documented items including counterfeit American Express travelers checks, overproof Jamaican rum, heroin, a dead hawk, an illegal Mexican passport, deer penis, purses made from endangered species, Cuban cigars, counterfeit Disney DVDs, khat, gold dust, GHB concealed as house cleaner, cow manure tooth powder, counterfeit Louis Vuitton bags, prohibited sausage, undeclared jewelry, steroids and an ostrich egg.

This catalog presents an edited version, selected by the artist, from the more than 1000 items she recorded.

Genres: Art

Paperback

First published October 1, 2010

About the author

Taryn Simon’s practice features rigorous research and an extensive engagement with archives, which help the artist explore systems of power. Her subjects have included bloodlines, the structure of the criminal justice system, and flower arrangements from photographs of political signings. Simon explores these interests in taxonomic photographs, text works, sculptures, films, and performances that critique long-standing institutions and the ways art has supported them.

The Innocents (2002), for example, documents wrongful conviction cases in the United States and considers how photography and mistaken identification can undermine criminal justice efforts. For An American Index of the Hidden and Unfamiliar (2007), Simon photographed traditionally out-of-sight objects and spaces—from a braille edition of Playboy to the CIA’s art collection—that she believed to be foundational to American mythologies.

Simon’s work belongs in the collections of the Art Institute of Chicago, the Centre Pompidou, the Guggenheim Museum, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Museum of Modern Art, and the Tate.

Reviews

[Joe · Rating 3 out of 5]

Maybe this work looks better on the gallery wall bigger and in grids? While I appreciate the neutral presentation of all of the items, and some of the stuff seized is wild, overall the book feels lifeless and flat. Perhaps punchier lighting and book design could have helped better support this very interesting concept.

[Chaler · Rating 3 out of 5]

Photo book is filled with disturbing images. Wish they were larger.