Little Frank and His Carp

Andrea Fraser

2001

Shot with hidden cameras, this six-minute video by contemporary artist Andrea Fraser documents an unauthorized intervention in the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao. During the course of her “visit,” Fraser listens raptly to the words on the audio guide and experiences what can be described euphemistically as an intense identification with the museum building, designed by the architect Frank Gehry, the “Little Frank” of the video’s title. As the recording expounds on the glories of its revolutionary architecture (not mentioning the art it contains), Fraser’s face expresses a range of emotional states in an exaggerated response to the tour’s narrative. Little Frank and His Carp is a send-up of contemporary museological seduction, amplifying and sensualizing the relationship between art and its audiences. The video highlights two of Fraser’s most identifiable artistic strategies: provocative performance that focuses on the body of the artist, and incisive institutional critique. [Permanent collection label, 2015]

Artist Andrea Fraser (American, b. 1965)
Title Little Frank and His Carp
Date 2001
Medium Video on DVD
Edition description ed. 12/25
Dimensions duration | 6min
Credit line University purchase, Parsons Fund, 2006
Object number WU 2006.0008

Work type film and video art

Andrea Fraser
Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum, Washington University in St. Louis, 08/21/2021 - 11/28/2021 Video Gallery

Performance and Performativity in Contemporary Art
Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum, Washington University in St. Louis, 09/09/2011 - 01/09/2012

Humor, Irony, and Satire: Strategies of Critique in Modern Art and Culture
Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum, Washington University in St. Louis, 05/21/2010 - 07/18/2010

Andrea Fraser, "What do I, as an artist, provide?"
Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum, Washington University in St. Louis, 05/11/2007 - 07/16/2007

Andrea Fraser, "What do I, as an artist, provide?" 2007

10/11/2006
Friedrich Petzel Gallery, New York

Inscription [On white DVD in black] [top:] Andrea Fraser / [italicized] LITTLE FRANK AND HIS CARP / 6 minutes [bottom:] COPYRIGHT 2001 ANDREA FRASER [running vertical on left side:] [signed in black:] Andrea Fraser [running vertical on right side in black script:] 12/25

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