Plug In Institute of Contemporary Art is honoured to present a talk with Chris Kraus, whose prolific and accumulated work as writer, critic, artist, and editor has had lasting influence on how art is percieved and written about. For her presentation at Plug In ICA, Kraus will read from Littoral Madness, a section of her forthcoming critical biography of American avant-garde writer Kathy Acker.

In this essay-in-progress, Kraus boldly posits types of writing and art production that capture a psychic, sensate and physical texture of transient life. The Tijuana grave of Juan Soldado (patron saint of border crossers); Dorothy Richardson’s 105-page account of the life of a dental assistant in London in 1916; Kate Durbin’s transcription of Kim Kardashian’s fairy tale wedding; the psycho-documentary photographs of Leigh Ledare and the installations of Parker Ito are subjects discussed.

As novelist and critic, Kraus is recognized for her lucid, playful and provoking first-person fiction narratives, which frequently blur theory, fiction, autobiography, and criticism. In her writing on contemporary art, Kraus has explored boredom, poetry, privatized prisons, community art, corporate philanthropy, vertically integrated manufacturing, and discarded utopias, revealing the surprising persistence of micro-cultures.

Kraus’ publications, praised for their intelligence, vulnerability and voracity, include: I Love Dick, Torpor, Aliens and Anorexia, Summer of Hate, Where Art Belongs, Video Green: Los Angeles Art and the Triumph of Nothingness, andKelly Lake Store. Her monograph, “Lost Properties,” was written as part ofSemiotexte’s pamphlet series for the 2014 Whitney Biennial. Kraus is the co-director of the acclaimed press Semiotext(e), where in 1990 she launched the imprint Native Agents, which introduced radical forms of writing by women writers. Native Agents has published the work of influential writers such as Penny Arcade, Fanny Howe, Ann Rower and Eileen Myles. She teaches in the Media Studies program at the European Graduate School.

This talk is available in our online video archive.

This talk is curated by Janique Vigier and would not be possible without the generous support of Cliff Eyland.

Plug In ICA gratefully acknowledges the support of the Canada Council for the Arts, the Manitoba Arts Council and Winnipeg Arts Council as well as generous donors, dedicated members and hardworking volunteers.

For general information please contact: info@plugin.org.