Photographs From The Heather And Tony Podesta Collection At The Phillips Collection, Washington, D.C.

"Left Behind: Selected Gifts from the Heather and Tony Podesta Collection features photographs of unpopulated architectural spaces as metaphors for social conditions and psychological states. This 90th anniversary installation celebrates the couple’s patronage and support of the Phillips and the museum’s growing collection of modern and contemporary photography.

Left Behind brings together works by emerging and established international artists who share an interest in the investigation of place: private (Darren Almond); urban (Frank Thiel, Massimo Vitali, and Catherine Yass); and social (Thomas Demand, Vesna Pavlović, Nicola Pellegrini, and Jane and Louise Wilson)....

While certain images are disquieting, revealing uninhabited places such as deserted casinos, abandoned institutions, or empty hotels, others present cityscapes, construction sites, and architecture in transition or staged environments that poignantly recall political events....

The Heather and Tony Podesta Collection stands today as one of the most important collections of contemporary art in the United States. Left Behind reflects the remarkable spirit, vision, taste, and unique perspective of the couple, who take curiosity, audacity, and risk as the guiding principles in their collecting practice."


Photo credits: Frank Thiel, Palast der Republik, Berlin, Germany, 2000 and 2006. Courtesy of Galerie Helga de Alvear and the Sean Kelly Gallery. © Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York / VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn.