"Protect Us From What We Don't Know" Summary

Jenny Holzer has been using declassified government documents since 2003 as a source for her text based artwork. She gets the information from the National Security Archive in Washington D.C.. The NSA collects and publishes materials made accessible through the Freedom of Information Act. Holzer enlarges the text to 33 x 25 ½ inch or 103 ½ x 80 inch . Holzer inserts these works into a long tradition of political pictures, like works from Goya and Picasso. Like Andy Warhol, Holzer’s work are photo silkscreens printed in a range of colors. She stays with black and white like ordinary typed documents, but sometimes chooses designer backgrounds. Also like Richter, Holzer selects her subject matter as a calculated political act as a way to facilitate historical memory. Holzer sees the archival documents as physical objects with specific visual qualities. The most significant visual aspect is the government censorship of the material before it is released. Names and identifications are usually blacked out. Large sections of the information are often gotten rid of. The censorship creates an abstraction in the documents. An example of Holzer’s work that is noteworthy is in the exhibition that is so-called Phoenix memo. It is a black on white seven canvas painting presenting an FBI document sent from the Phoenix AZ office to the counter terrorism division dated July 10th 2001. That is 2 months before the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. At the top and bottom of each page the word Secret has been printed then crossed out with a marker. The purpose of the memo was “to advise the Bureau and New York of the possibility of a coordinated effort by Bin Laden to send students to the US to attend civil aviation universities and colleges.” The Phoenix memo’s foresee 9/11 and the document’s prolonged life in the news make the painting powerful. Holzer’s use of these documents and others are unique in telling stories that the viewer can interpret in their own manner.