The Ballad of Sexual Dependency explained

The Ballad of Sexual Dependency is a 1985 slide show exhibition and 1986 artist's book publication of photographs taken between 1979 and 1986 by photographer Nan Goldin.[1] [2] Consisting of over 700 images, it is an autobiographical document of a portion of New York City's No wave music and art scene, the post-Stonewall gay subculture of the late 1970s and early 1980s, the heroin subculture of the Bowery neighborhood, and Goldin's personal family and love life.[3]

Critic Sean O'Hagan, writing in The Guardian in 2014, said it "remains a benchmark for all other work in a similar confessional vein."[4] Lucy Davies, writing in The Telegraph in 2014, said it "would come to influence a generation of fledgling photographers, who fell into her truth-telling wake. She was credited by Bill Clinton with inventing heroin chic".[1]

Details

The title The Ballad of Sexual Dependency was adapted from a song in Bertolt Brecht's Threepenny Opera.[5]

It was originally devised as a slideshow set to the music of Velvet Underground, James Brown, Nina Simone, Charles Aznavour, Screamin' Jay Hawkins and Petula Clark among others, to entertain Goldin's friends. It "portrayed her friends – many of them part of the hard-drugs subculture on New York's Lower East Side – as they partied, got high, fought and had sex. It was first publicly shown at the Whitney Biennial in New York in 1985 and was published as a photobook the following year."

The snapshot aesthetic book was first published with help from Marvin Heiferman, Mark Holborn, and Suzanne Fletcher in 1986.[6]

Solo exhibitions

Publications

Collections

The Ballad of Sexual Dependency is held in the following permanent collection:

External links

Notes and References

  1. News: Nan Goldin: unafraid of the dark. 26 Jun 2009 . 27 December 2014 . Drusilla . Beyfus . .
  2. News: Landmarks in the Ascent of Nan. 14 November 1999 . 27 December 2014 . Michael . Bracewell . .
  3. Book: Goldin, Nan . The ballad of sexual dependency. 2012 . Aperture Foundation. New York, N.Y.. 978-1-59711-208-6. 2012 reissue . Marvin Heiferman . Mark Holborn . Suzanne Fletcher.
  4. News: Nan Goldin: 'I wanted to get high from a really early age'. 20 July 2010 . 27 December 2014 . Sean . O'Hagan . Sean O'Hagan (journalist) . .
  5. Web site: Johnson . Ken . Bleak Reality in Nan Goldin’s ‘The Ballad of Sexual Dependency’ . The New York Times . 14 July 2016 . 20 June 2024.
  6. Web site: The Ballad of Sexual Dependency . Fraenkel Gallery . 13 February 2024 . 20 June 2024.
  7. Web site: NAN GOLDIN . . 2020 . . 19 June 2024.
  8. Web site: Nan Goldin's Sexual Sanctuary on view at Portland Museum of Art. Daniel. Kany. November 5, 2017.
  9. Web site: Nan Goldin: Until 27 October 2019 – Display at Tate Modern. Tate.
  10. News: Joanna. Walters. 2019-03-24. Tate art galleries will no longer accept donations from the Sackler family. The Guardian. 22 March 2019. 0261-3077. www.theguardian.com.

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