Sarah Charlesworth

Sarah Charlesworth, an American conceptual artist and photographer, is renowned as a pivotal figure within The Pictures Generation, an informal collective of artists active in New York during the late 1970s and early 1980s.

Biography of Sarah Charlesworth

Sarah Charlesworth was born in 1947 in East Orange, New Jersey, USA. She earned a Bachelor of Arts degree from Barnard College in 1969, having previously studied under Douglas Huebler at Bradford College. Additionally, she briefly studied under the photographer Lisette Model at The New School. Following her studies, she pursued freelance photography work.

In 1975, Charlesworth co-founded The Fox, a magazine dedicated to art theory, along with conceptual artists Michael Corris, Preston Heller, Joseph Kosuth, Andrew Menard, and Mel Ramsden. Notably, her series "Modern History" (1977–79) featured photographs of the front pages of American and Canadian newspapers, emphasizing only their photographs and mastheads.

Throughout the 1980s, Charlesworth was associated with the Pictures Generation alongside artists like Jack Goldstein and Sherrie Levine. In 1980, she created the series "Stills," depicting bodies falling from buildings, sourced from news wires and archives, and rephotographed and enlarged by Charlesworth.

Charlesworth also co-founded BOMB magazine in 1981 and produced the series "Objects of Desire" (1983–88), exploring iconographies of sexuality, power, and desire. Later works, such as "Renaissance Paintings and Renaissance Drawings" (1991), combined imagery from Italian Renaissance art to create new compositions.

In the early 1990s, Charlesworth began photographing actual objects. Her "Available Light" series (2012) experimented with light's role in photography, reflecting her interest in the artist's role, artistic production conditions, and formal relations.

Aside from her artistic endeavors, Charlesworth held teaching positions at institutions like New York University, the School of Visual Arts, and Hartford University. She taught Master Critique in the MFA Photography, Video, and Related Media Program at The School of Visual Arts until her passing.

Sarah Charlesworth died of a brain aneurysm in 2013, leaving behind a significant legacy in conceptual art and photography.