artist biography
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Jenny Perlin’s practice in 16mm film, video, and drawing works with and against the documentary tradition, incorporating innovative stylistic techniques to emphasize issues of truth, misunderstanding, and personal history. Each aspect of Perlin’s practice looks closely at the ways in which social machinations are reflected in the smallest elements of daily life. Whether it is copying a receipt from Wal-Mart, a headline from Reuters, unpacking 1950s FBI archives, or filming documentary-style interviews at the corner store, her interest is in the ways in which the sweeping statements of history affect specific details of human experience.
Perlin’s works have been exhibited at The Museum of Modern Art, New York, The Kitchen, New York, The Drawing Center, New York, P.S.1, New York, The Whitney Museum of Art, New York, CCA Wattis, San Francisco, Ulrich Museum of Art, Kansas, Centre pour l’image contemporaine, Geneva, Aldrich Museum, Connecticut, De Appel, Amsterdam, Kunsthalle Exnergasse, Vienna, Rotterdam Film Festival, Berlin Film Festival, Images Film Festival, Toronto, among others. She holds a B.A. in Literature and Society from Brown University, an M.F.A. in Filmmaking from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, and completed postgraduate studies at the Whitney Museum Independent Study Program, New York.
Perlin is represented by Annet Gelink Gallery, Amsterdam, and Galerie M+R Fricke, Berlin.