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The Last Descendants
an essay by
Kris Imants Ercums
Curator of Global Contempoary and Asian Art
Spencer Museum of Art
In her recent series The Last Descendants Judith Levy charts the rich complexity of an individual through meticulously drawn “family trees” that outline in startling detail the lineage of noted fictional personalities: Huck Finn; Hansel and Gretel; and most recently, the Lone Ranger. Each document is paired with a dramatized video interview with the “living descendants” of these mythic characters. The use of documentary evidence intentionally staged as “proof” for family heritage is part of an overall strategy by Levy to re-imagine history. Deploying a wide range of research methods from rummaging through junk stores for just-the-right photo to reading broadly on the major issues that have shaped society like war and disease, Levy blurs the distinction between the grand narrative of historical fact and a fictionalized, highly personal imagining of the individual. In this way Levy takes advantage of Voltaire’s observation that history “consists of a series of accumulated imaginative inventions.”
Through this work Levy confronts major issues like migration, race and sexuality that are at the heart of contemporary American identity. By recasting cultural memory through the personal lineage of iconic, albeit entirely fictional characters, Levy preys on our naïveté of American popular culture—“Huck Finn was Jewish?” By suspending belief, Levy is able probe issues important to her. This broad lens brings into focus the monumental complexity of human interaction that goes into the construction of each personal narrative. It also distorts broader perceptions of reality and imagination. Tackling romantic notions like “America the Melting Pot,” these poignant investigations bring to the foreground monumental forces like religion, ethnic background and sexual desire that shape identity.
However, mythology often warns us against looking back—think of Lot’s wife turned to salt. And great writers like Marcel Proust recall how disappointing memory can be, as it never truly restores the past. Scientists who work on memory, also call into question the pure form of remembering that we often times idealize. Rather, current research suggests that we only recall our past in a fragmented, discontinuous way. Memory is not archived as a whole, but exists as a highly selective and constantly changing phenomenon. This subjectivity, the imaginative potential embedded in memory, is at the core of Levy’s The Last Descendants. While seemingly whole and complete, each “fact” is a carefully poised fragment, a carefully constructed “lie” that challenges “truth” as something ultimately subjective and constructed. Thus, the series is far from a Proustian attempt to grasp at the past—that fleeting and unattainable taste of a Madeleine cookie—but instead the work is an elegiac journey through the workings of individual imagination.
Kris Imants Ercums
Curator of Global Contempoary and Asian Art
Spencer Museum of Art
an essay by
Kris Imants Ercums
Curator of Global Contempoary and Asian Art
Spencer Museum of Art
In her recent series The Last Descendants Judith Levy charts the rich complexity of an individual through meticulously drawn “family trees” that outline in startling detail the lineage of noted fictional personalities: Huck Finn; Hansel and Gretel; and most recently, the Lone Ranger. Each document is paired with a dramatized video interview with the “living descendants” of these mythic characters. The use of documentary evidence intentionally staged as “proof” for family heritage is part of an overall strategy by Levy to re-imagine history. Deploying a wide range of research methods from rummaging through junk stores for just-the-right photo to reading broadly on the major issues that have shaped society like war and disease, Levy blurs the distinction between the grand narrative of historical fact and a fictionalized, highly personal imagining of the individual. In this way Levy takes advantage of Voltaire’s observation that history “consists of a series of accumulated imaginative inventions.”
Through this work Levy confronts major issues like migration, race and sexuality that are at the heart of contemporary American identity. By recasting cultural memory through the personal lineage of iconic, albeit entirely fictional characters, Levy preys on our naïveté of American popular culture—“Huck Finn was Jewish?” By suspending belief, Levy is able probe issues important to her. This broad lens brings into focus the monumental complexity of human interaction that goes into the construction of each personal narrative. It also distorts broader perceptions of reality and imagination. Tackling romantic notions like “America the Melting Pot,” these poignant investigations bring to the foreground monumental forces like religion, ethnic background and sexual desire that shape identity.
However, mythology often warns us against looking back—think of Lot’s wife turned to salt. And great writers like Marcel Proust recall how disappointing memory can be, as it never truly restores the past. Scientists who work on memory, also call into question the pure form of remembering that we often times idealize. Rather, current research suggests that we only recall our past in a fragmented, discontinuous way. Memory is not archived as a whole, but exists as a highly selective and constantly changing phenomenon. This subjectivity, the imaginative potential embedded in memory, is at the core of Levy’s The Last Descendants. While seemingly whole and complete, each “fact” is a carefully poised fragment, a carefully constructed “lie” that challenges “truth” as something ultimately subjective and constructed. Thus, the series is far from a Proustian attempt to grasp at the past—that fleeting and unattainable taste of a Madeleine cookie—but instead the work is an elegiac journey through the workings of individual imagination.
Kris Imants Ercums
Curator of Global Contempoary and Asian Art
Spencer Museum of Art
