Exhibition: Jim Hodges: Craig’s closet

Written By Dave Harper

June 9, 2023—May 29, 2024

Gallery:

About the Exhibition:

For those of us with the good fortune to have a place to hang our things, a closet is a magical container, a collection of materials, arranged by each of us that at a glance can reveal our values, desires, cares, and even our deepest secrets. Time itself is frozen inside a closet in contrasting meters and timelines, fragmented in things accumulated and arranged in juxtaposed order, stacked and aligned, quickly thrown or casually dropped there to be taken care of later. The scene is set, and the narratives that blossom come alive whenever the doors swing open, giving us a reading, a reminder, an understanding of who we are, where we have been, secrets, and dreams we hold. Boxes concealing our heart’s contours, scribbled messages scratched on folded notes and cards, photos, records, files, all the stuff worth saving for the reason that each thing signifies, all these choices contained in the holding space, the closet.

Craig’s closet was created by Jim Hodges for the New York City AIDS Memorial Park. On view from June 9, 2023—May 29, 2024, it was sited within New York City AIDS Memorial Park, in the shadow of the former St. Vincent’s hospital and proximity to many sites central to the HIV/AIDS epidemic. This replica of a domestic bedroom closet in granite with additions of painted bronze invited viewers to forge personal connections between complex histories and individual and collective memories.

Craig’s closet is a continuation of the New York City AIDS Memorial’s public art program, which has included installations and events by Steven Evans, Jean-Michel Othoniel, Jenny Holzer, and others. The sculpture will be on view for one year and is exhibited as a part of NYC Parks’ Art in the Parks program.

About the Artist

Jim Hodges was born in 1957 in Spokane, Washington. Hodges is an artist who addresses issues such as memory, love, and existential struggles through a multifaceted practice that includes photography, screen printing, and sculpture. His use of found materials like rocks and denim, coupled with the adoption of transitory shapes like spiderwebs, speaks of a personal experience that resonates on a collective level filtered through elements available in nature. Mysterious, beautiful, poetic, and conceptually deep, Hodges's work has the rare quality of being simultaneously thought-provoking and visually beautiful. Major public installations by Hodges include ‘I dreamed a world and called it Love’, Grand Central Station, New York (2021), ‘Unearthed’ Grace Cathedral, San Francisco, (2019), and ‘With Liberty and Justice For All’ Aspen Art Museum, Colorado (2015), and his works are included in prominent collections internationally, including the Art Institute of Chicago, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, the Dallas Museum of Art, the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, Miami Art Museum, Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington D.C, Museum of Modern Art, New York, Guggenheim Museum, New York, Walker Art Centre, Minneapolis, Musee National, Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris, France.

Selected Press

Featured
NEW YORK TIMES: Why Can’t New York Make a Proper Monument to Gay History?

Holland Cotter writes: “Closer to home there was…a stirring lament of a public sculpture, called “Craig’s Closet” by the American artist Jim Hodges, installed in the park adjacent to the New York City AIDS Memorial. In part thanks to its placement near the memorial, the piece kept personal and political content in subtle sync, in an image that spoke of lives we had and have, lives we lost and are still losing, and lives we need to fight not to forget.”

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ARTFORUM: Top Ten

Chris Bogia is a Queens, New York–based artist as well as the cofounder and former executive director of Fire Island Artist Residency (FIAR). In February’s Artforum, he shares his Top Ten, which includes Jim Hodges’ Craig’s closet at the New York City AIDS Memorial, which, he writes, “interrupts the artist’s kaleidoscopic parade with a dark intermission,” as “a meaningful marker.”

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SMITHSONIAN MAGAZINE: New Sculpture Comes to New York City’s AIDS Memorial Park

St. Vincent’s Triangle, a small park in New York City’s Greenwich Village neighborhood, is named for the hospital that once stood nearby. A site of sorrow and loss for the LGBTQ+ community, St. Vincent’s hospital was known as ground zero of the city’s AIDS epidemic, opening the first ward for AIDS care on the East Coast in 1984. The triangle is a fitting site for the New York City AIDS Memorial—which opened in 2016—and for a new sculpture unveiled earlier this month: Called Craig’s closet, the artwork will remain at the site until May 2024.

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HYPERALLERGIC: Poignant Public Artwork Honors New Yorkers Lost to AIDS

Maya Pontone writes: “A granite and painted bronze replica of a bedroom closet frozen in time, “Craig’s closet” is an intimate interior space brought outdoors that explores the intangible experiences and memories contained in material objects left behind: shirts and jackets on hangers; filled drawers and packed shelves; stacks of untouched books and folders; bags and boxes holding unknown treasures.”

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T MAGAZINE T List: A Bronze Closet as a Memorial in New York City’s West Village

Jameson Montgomery writes: “This year, a sculptural installation by the artist Jim Hodges has been added to the triangle’s small lawn. Titled “Craig’s Closet,” the work honors the musician Craig Ducote, with whom Hodges lived at the time of his death in 2016.”

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ARTNET NEWS: ‘The Dreams We Hold’: Jim Hodges on His Loving and Profound New Memorial in NYC, ‘Craig’s closet’

An open closet now stands in New York’s AIDS Memorial Park. In it are hangers and hoodies, stacked boxes and folded weekend bags. The structure looks, in other words, like a generic storage space. It is and it isn’t.

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THE ART NEWSPAPER: Sculptural symbol of mourning by Jim Hodges unveiled at New York’s Aids Memorial Park

The New York City Aids Memorial in has unveiled a new, site-specific sculpture by Jim Hodges as part of its public art initiative and the city’s Art in the Parks programme. Opened in 2016 to honour the more than 100,000 New Yorkers who have died of Aids, the memorial has hosted nearly 20 installations and events

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CULTURED: This Week In Culture: June 5 - June 11, 2023

Recognized for his beautiful transpositions of the intimate world into art, Jim Hodges is set to debut his new sculpture, Craig’s closet, this week. The granite and bronze sculpture, which is a rendering of a literal closet, asks viewers to think about items they keep sacred. The piece brings the personal into the public, confronting viewers with the boundaries between both. The sculpture will be on display for one year, continuing the New York City AIDS Memorial’s public art program.

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Support

Leadership support for Jim Hodges’ Craig’s closet is provided by the Flag Art Foundation; Amy and John Phelan; Jennifer and John Eagle; Gladstone Gallery; and Stephen Friedman Gallery, with major support provided by Ron Pizzuti; and Cindy and Howard Rachofsky, and additional support provided ​​by Anthony and Celeste Meier; Lisa and John Runyon; Nancy and Clint Carlson; Marguerite Hoffman; and UOVO Fine Art Storage.

Craig’s closet is exhibited through NYC Parks’ Art in the Parks program and is supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council.

 

Image Credits: Jim Hodges, Craig's closet, 2023, Granite and bronze, 90 x 57 x 28 1/2 inches (228.6 x 144.8 x 72.4 cm)
Installation view: New York City AIDS Memorial Park; Presented by the New York City AIDS Memorial, June 9, 2023-May 31, 2024
© Jim Hodges, Courtesy of the artist and Gladstone Gallery
Photography by Daniel Greer

Dave Harper
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