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Koh, Germaine
Sightings
1992-1998

Through her conceptual approach to art making, Germaine Koh draws attention to the banality of daily life, the commonalities of human experience and the tenuous boundaries between public and private spheres. Koh was born in Malaysia and received her BFA at the University of Ottawa and her MFA at Hunter College of City University in New York. The influence of Fluxus and of conceptual artists On Kawara and Felix-Gonzales Torres are evident in her work. Sightings is an ongoing project begun by Koh in 1992 involving the reclamation of lost or discarded photographs and their transformation into postcards. The damaged, out of focus, or end of roll shots of strangers, sometimes deeply personal, are entered into broad circulation. Koh plays on the North American compulsion, demonstrated by the popularity of web cameras and reality television to share intimate details, and to have a window on the personal lives of others. The resultant images are ultimately highly ordinary and strangely familiar, thus subverting our notions of individuality.

 
Koh, Germaine
born Georgetown, Malaysia 1967
Sightings
1992-1998
postcards, 23 designs, edition of 1000-2500
10.0 x 15.0 cm
Gift of the artist, 1997
40-021.01

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