Barbara Kruger

1. What it is — photograph, 55 × 41 in (Art21), portrait orientation; authored work, Mary Boone. A found photograph of a classical bust of a woman's head in profile, "whose neck disappears into a block of stone" (Smarthistory), plus seven words. First phase of the series: text black on white labels, red only as the frame.
2. Composition — the bust occupies x 20–95%, looking RIGHT, nose at x ≈ 78%; text in a narrow left-hand column x 10–24%, seven labels of one word each, evenly spaced y 10–90% — Smarthistory: "in a vertical column, like a ransom note, to the left of the bust". Four labels (Your / hits / side / face) have a black L-bracket in the upper left corner, three (gaze / the / of my) do not — a rhythm of 1-0-1-0-1-0-1 that pulls the eye down the column. The eye enters on "Your" top left, reads down the column, then is deflected rightward by the profile — the viewer is physically on the side the bust is NOT looking at: the sentence is descriptively accurate ("your gaze hits the side of my face").
3. Colour — black-and-white, halftone grain visible; red only in the frame (2% of the format). No red label — evidence that the label was originally typesetting (black on white, as if cut from a newspaper), and the red came later as a brand.
4. Typography — class: geometric grotesque, bold italic, lowercase with a tall Y; each word on its own white label, the label the width of the word (not the column) — which is why the right edge of the column "jumps". Specific typeface not confirmed for this work (Fonts In Use has no record); Futura Bold Oblique documented for the oeuvre (Kemper, Eye 109), not for this sheet.
5. Message — Smarthistory: a direct response to Mulvey 1975; "you" is the presumed male viewer. Three seconds: face + "Your gaze". Five metres: bust, column; not the words — the labels are small. This work demands half a metre, unlike 05 and 07.
6. Why exactly this way — profile right + text left: so that the viewer who reads from the left stands exactly "to the side". Had the bust looked left, into the text, the sentence would have been a lie.
7. What would kill it — one label with the whole sentence at the bottom. The word-by-word column is what creates the tempo (seven beats) and the "ransom note" effect.

Principles: Label over the image Pronoun without an antecedent The designer writes the headline Cheap technique as language To verify against the image: the technique is not confirmed (Art21 lists only "photograph"; 1981–82 sheets of the same series are gelatin silver — Art21 states this for Your comfort); whether the frame is painted or photographed with the work remains open.

1. What it is — gelatin silver print, mounted and framed, 182.2 × 115.8 cm (MoMA, anonymous fund). A found reproduction of a detail from Michelangelo's The Creation of Adam (two fingers, cracks in the vault) + a sentence in five black bands.
2. Composition — five black bands across the full width: y 2–8% ("You invest in the"), y 24–28% (empty), y 42–58% ("divinity" — huge, one word across the whole format), y 76–80% (empty), y 92–98% ("of the masterpiece"). The image is sliced as if through a blind: the fingers touch at y ≈ 33%, x 45–60%, exactly in the band of image between the first empty band and "divinity". The eye travels: top left → fingers → "divinity" (which stops everything) → down. MoMA describes this as the creation of man set against audacious text.
3. Colour — black-and-white; red only the frame. The contrast is between the "sharp" text and the soft light of Michelangelo's fresco — the fresco's soft tone against the hard black bands.
4. Typography — white geometric grotesque, bold italic, on black; three sizes: "divinity" ≈ 14% of the format's height, the upper and lower phrases ≈ 3%. One word carries the image, the rest of the sentence is small — Two reading distances.
5. Message — the pronoun "You" draws the viewer into perpetuating the patriarchal narratives of religion and art history; art is secularised religion that is bought and sold. Five metres: fingers + DIVINITY. Half a metre: "you invest" — you invest both money and faith.
6. Why exactly this way — the most famous image in Western art, which must not be altered; so the operation is from OUTSIDE: bands laid over, nothing within the image. The authority of the source stays legible and works against the source — Détournement of the official image.
7. What would kill it — removing the two empty bands. Without them the image is "an illustration with a caption"; with them the image is TRAPPED, the fingers touch through a grille.

Principles: Détournement of the official image Bar across the whole format Pronoun without an antecedent Two reading distances To verify against the image: whether the frame is red and whether it is part of the work or a museum addition.

1. What it is — one of nine sheets in a portfolio; offset lithograph and screenprint with lithograph and blind embossing, 52.1 × 52.1 cm; Peter Blum Edition, printer Derriere L'Etoile Studios, NY; edition 50 + 10 AP; this impression 37/50 (MoMA). The portfolio's title flips the proverb "children should be seen and not heard".
2. Composition — square. Two crossed forearms with clenched fists occupy x 5–95%, y 10–65% — an X across the format; the eye enters on the fists (y ≈ 55%) and only then finds the word "n o t" BELOW them, y ≈ 60%, x 30–60%, tiny, yellow, letterspaced. Above and below the elbows a flat yellow field (not a background — it outlines the arms as a silhouette). The gesture (refusal) is the message, the word only confirms it.
3. Colour — the only work in this selection without red: black-and-white halftone + YELLOW field (~#F2C21B) which is also the colour of the letters. Colour works as hierarchy: yellow = what isn't the photograph (the field and the word are the same layer). The portfolio carries other colours per sheet; the whole portfolio has not been reviewed.
4. Typography — geometric grotesque, italic, LOWERCASE letters, ~2% of the format height, spacing ≈ 4 em — three letters scattered under the fists. No label: the letters sit directly on the image. Spacing slows reading — the only word in the format is the quietest.
5. Message — MoMA on the portfolio: first person plural, "we", an invitation to question media messages. Five metres: the X made by the arms = "no". Half a metre: "not" — the word repeats the gesture, adds nothing to it; the cover test passes (Fukuda's criterion).
6. Why exactly this way — a portfolio of nine sheets asks to be recognised as a series without a red label; that's why the operation is reversed here: the word is SHRUNK, the colour changed, the gesture enlarged. Proof that the system is not a "red-and-white label" but a RELATIONSHIP between the large image and the small word.
7. What would kill it — "NOT" in capitals on a red label. It would become a poster; as it is it's a whisper beneath the blow.

Principles: Spacing slows reading One image, one word Colour as hierarchy, not decoration To verify against the image: which of the three techniques (litho / screen / blind embossing) carries the yellow. The other eight sheets (MoMA 59845–59854) have not been reviewed; the portfolio's title is probably on one of them.

1. What it is — photographic screenprint on vinyl, 111 × 113 in (Art21, Mary Boone) — almost a square; 1987. The Broad holds the 1987–2019 version: single-channel video on an LED panel with sound, 350.2 × 350.2 cm. It also exists as a bag, a t-shirt, a keyring — the full merch — the work is its own distribution. The year of the work is 1987; the PGDA record cites a different date, which belongs to the version/release, not to the work's creation.
2. Composition — a found photograph of an open hand, thumb up to the left, holding a white card; card x 25–80%, y 22–65%, tilted ≈ −3° (held, not resting); fingers emerge above and below the card. The eye: card (brightest field) → text → hand. The card is a physical object within the image (the hand holds it), not a label OVER the image — the only one of eight where the label sits inside the photograph's space.
3. Colour — black-and-white halftone; card white; text RED on white (the reverse of the standard white-on-red); frame red. Red = text + frame, nothing else.
4. Typography — geometric grotesque, bold italic; three lines: "I shop" ≈ 12% of the format height, "therefore" ≈ 4%, "I am" ≈ 12% — the conjunction shrunk, subject and predicate large; the sentence reads as two slogans with a footnote in between.
5. Message — Descartes inverted: "cogito ergo sum" → I shop, therefore I am; Slogan in a new context — the source recognisable, the surroundings (a card in hand = credit card) change the meaning. Five metres: hand + I SHOP. Half a metre: "therefore" — a philosophical conjunction in an advert. "I" without an antecedent: who is speaking, the hand or the viewer?
6. Why exactly this way — the card in the hand is Kruger's only label that has a REASON to be in the image: a credit card. Hence red on white — the card is plastic, not a sign.
7. What would kill it — white text on a red label over the hand. It would return to the standard and lose the object; the hand would be holding nothing.

Principles: Slogan in a new context Label over the image Pronoun without an antecedent One image, one word The artefact carries distribution To verify against the image: the PGDA image is probably a bag or print, not the vinyl from 1987; the proportion is the same, the 1987 original has not been verified against the image.

1. What it is — screenprint on vinyl, 276.5 × 531.3 × 6.4 cm (Whitney, Emily Fisher Landau). The same work on billboards across New York, Public Art Fund, 1.11.1988–31.1.1989 (eight photographs in the archive); installation Las Vegas 1987 (Art21). It's based on a found reproduction of an advertising illustration: a girl in profile feeling the biceps of a boy flexing it.
2. Composition — landscape format ≈ 1:1.92. A red band across the full width at y 55–72% (17% of the height), in the lower third; girl x 5–50%, boy x 45–95%; the boy's fist upper right (x ≈ 85%, y ≈ 15%), the girl's finger on the bicep at y ≈ 80% — the band runs between fist and finger, cutting the scene exactly between the gesture (flexing) and the reaction (touch). The boy looks at the viewer; the girl looks at him. The eye travels: the boy's face → band (sentence) → finger. According to the Whitney audio guide, the enlargement makes the halftone dots visible.
3. Colour — black-and-white + one red (band, frame). The illustration was probably in colour — the reduction to black-and-white is an operation (Walters: "crude, newsprint images").
4. Typography — geometric grotesque, bold italic, white, one line, ≈ 9% of the format height, across the whole band with small margins — readable from the street off the billboard.
5. Message — title of a 1985 Tina Turner song (Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome) used as a slogan; the Whitney reads it as a question about stereotypes of who is allowed to be a hero. "We" without an antecedent pulls the viewer into a plural that refuses. At five metres what remains are two children and the sentence; the test passes as a billboard — the work IS a billboard.
6. Why exactly this way — an illustration from a 1950s advert already speaks in advertising's language (muscle = masculinity, admiration = femininity); the band doesn't illustrate but refutes the image in the same tone of voice. The image must not be cropped closer: both the finger and the fist must be visible.
7. What would kill it — the band moved to the top. Then it would be a headline (the image illustrating the text); as it is, the band is a verdict that comes after the image.

Principles: Slogan in a new context Bar across the whole format Pronoun without an antecedent Grain and blur as shape The artefact carries distribution To verify against the image: the source of the illustration (Whitney: "an image printed in a magazine or book" — author unknown, Rockwell-type, not to be claimed as Rockwell); whether the image is a drawing or a photograph has not been confirmed.

1. What it is — photograph and screenprint in a painted wooden artist's frame, 130.3 × 173.5 × 4.6 cm (SFMOMA, Fisher Collection). A found 19th-century photograph: a bearded man in a coat, arm raised, standing over a naked body laid on a table covered with cloth; on the wall a shelf of bottles — an anatomical/medical scene.
2. Composition — landscape format 3:4 (reversed: 1.33 width). The man x 5–30%, body diagonal x 15–90%, y 55–80%; the words "N o R a d i o" at y 42–48%, x 30–75%, in the space between the raised arm and the body — in the place where a headline would sit in an advert. The eye goes: the man's face → arm → word → body. The frame is red and thick (≈ 3%).
3. Colour — black-and-white + red: letters and frame. The letters are red directly on the photograph, without a label — the only such example in this selection; the frame is painted wood (part of the work, according to the record).
4. Typography — geometric grotesque, bold italic, spacing ≈ 3 em, ≈ 5% of the height — two words stretched across 45% of the width. Spacing slows reading: the sign reads letter by letter, like a sign in a shop window.
5. Message — "No Radio" is the sign New York drivers in the 1980s left on their windows so a thief wouldn't smash the glass (Washington Post 1989, "No radio, nothing in trunk"). That context doesn't come from the SFMOMA record but from a newspaper source about the phrase itself, not about the work. The link to the body on the table (nothing to steal) is a reading, not a documented fact. At five metres the scene and the red dots are visible; at half a metre the words are read.
6. Why exactly this way — the spacing carries the effect. If "No Radio" had been set normally in a label, it would be a slogan; letterspaced and small it becomes a sign on an object — as on a car.
7. What would kill it — a white label on red across the middle. The body would disappear beneath the band, and the work lives on the fact that the whole body is visible.

Principles: Spacing slows reading One image, one word Colour as hierarchy, not decoration To verify against the image: the identity of the source photograph (medical? theatrical?); whether the man's raised arm is holding some object. The SFMOMA record has no text — fields 5–6 are a reading.

1. What it is — photographic silkscreen on vinyl, 284.48 × 284.48 cm (Broad; Art21 112 × 112 in). Made as a POSTER for the Women's March on Washington, April 1989, against the wave of laws that were tearing down Roe v. Wade (Broad); Eye 5: "I got frustrated and did it myself. I went out with my students… putting up the posters". Found studio portrait of a woman (1950s), frontal.
2. Composition — square. Face split exactly at x = 50%: left positive, right negative (Broad: "split in positive and negative exposures"). Three labels: "Your body" y 12–22%, x 22–78%; "is a" y 44–52%, x 40–60% — sits on the bridge of the nose, right on the dividing line, between the eyes; "battleground" y 78–88%, x 15–85%, across the mouth and chin. The eye travels: eyes (y ≈ 32%, one dark, one white) → "is a" → down to "battleground" → back up to "Your body". Broad: the face "without a body, divided and obscured by text, signals a sharp division".
3. Colour — black and white + red label. The negative on the right is half the image "in colour" without colour: halftone dots on the right half light, skin black — one operation (One operation per piece: invert half) makes all the contrast; red only carries the words. Black and white before colour literally: the composition stands in positive and negative, colour is added as type.
4. Typography — geometric grotesque, bold italic, white, three lines, label widths = width of the word (hence three different widths, centred) — "is a" is narrow so it doesn't cover the eyes. Letter height ≈ 7% of the format — legible from 20 m.
5. Message — Broad: "simultaneously art and protest"; "you" here is a woman (unlike in 01, where it's a man) — same pronoun, different audience, same indeterminacy. Five metres: face + battleground. Half a metre: "is a" between the eyes. Walters (Eye 109): today it works as a "statement of fact" for all sides.
6. Why exactly this way — a poster for the street: square (sticks anywhere), one face (recognisable from across the street), split in half (argument without words — the body is already divided). The words only name what the image is already doing.
7. What would kill it — shifting the dividing line from x = 50% or a soft transition instead of a sharp cut. The division must be a cut, not a gradient — this is a war line.

Principles: One operation per piece Label over the image Pronoun without an antecedent Black and white before colour The artefact carries distribution One image, one word To verify against the image: whether the 1989 street poster also had text about the march (date, call to action) below it. The source of the portrait is not confirmed.

1. What it is — offset lithograph, 27.3 × 22.9 cm, Hearst Corporation (publisher and printer), mass print run (MoMA SC731.1995). Esquire cover, Howard Stern. Roberts (MoMA 2004): visual strategies "which she appropriated from mass media are returned to their sources on covers she made for Newsweek and Esquire".
2. Composition — Stern's portrait centred, hair fills the top two thirds; three labels in a downward-widening step: "I" y 15–22% / x 47–58%; "hate" y 36–47% / x 33–67% (across the nose and mouth — the eyes remain open above); "myself" y 55–68% / x 20–80%; below, small "and you love me for it" y 72–75%, x 40–65%. Top left, house cover lines in red labels ("Shocking but True! HOWARD STERN BLITZES AMERICA By Barbara Kruger") — and these too are in her format: the cover has entirely become her work. The Esquire masthead (the house script) remains.
3. Colour — black and white portrait and red labels; the same red for the masthead — the magazine and the artist share the colour, so you can't see where one ends.
4. Typography — geometric grotesque, bold italic; "myself" ≈ 13% of height, "I" ≈ 7%, the small line ≈ 2% — three sizes: Two reading distances (from the kiosk: I HATE MYSELF; from the hand: "and you love me for it" — the second message mocks the first, as with Jamie Reid).
5. Message — "I" is Stern? her? the reader? The label across the mouth speaks instead of him. At five metres: face and hate. At half a metre: a sentence that blames the buyer ("you love me for it") — the buyer of the magazine is the addressee.
6. Why exactly this way — the magazine is her home institution; here is proof that the system works even when returned to its source — and that then it's indistinguishable from advertising. The small line is the only difference between her cover and an ordinary one.
7. What would kill it — removing the small line. What would remain is "I hate myself" as a shock headline — a tabloid without the twist.

Principles: Two reading distances Label over the image Pronoun without an antecedent Fixed system as brand The artefact carries distribution To verify against the image: whether "By Barbara Kruger" is the credit for the text in the issue (i.e. whether she also wrote the article) — not confirmed; the portrait photographer is not credited.