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Jeremy Blake
Century 21, from the Winchester trilogy, 2004

Century 21 is part of Jeremy Blake’s Winchester trilogy, which also includes Winchester(2002) and 1906 (2003). The three video projections were inspired by the Winchester Mystery House in San Jose, an elaborate and bizarre 160-room Victorian mansion built between 1884 and 1922 by Sarah L. Winchester, heir to the Winchester rifle fortune. Believing herself to be cursed by those killed by her family’s firearms, she was convinced that continuous construction on her house would keep their malevolent spirits away.

For Blake, Winchester and her mansion offered ideal vehicles for exploring American mythologies and identities. Century 21 ventures away from the house toward the three domed movie theaters next door: Century 21, 22, and 23. Whereas the mansion represents irrationality and the nostalgic reconstruction of the past, the neighboring space-age buildings embody twentieth-century aspirations toward a presumably rational modernity. The cinemas also double as venues for the Hollywood westerns of the 1950s and 60s, which often glorified the violence upon which the Winchester fortune was made.

Artwork Info

Artwork title
Century 21, from the Winchester trilogy
Artist name
Jeremy Blake
Date created
2004
Classification
digital media
Medium
digital animation with sound, 12:06 min.
Dimensions
dimensions variable
Date acquired
2005
Credit
Collection SFMOMA
Accessions Committee Fund purchase: gift of Carla Emil and Rich Silverstein, Mimi and Peter Haas, Helen and Charles Schwab, and Robin Wright
Copyright
© Estate of Jeremy Aaron Blake
Permanent URL
https://www.sfmoma.org/artwork/2005.181
Artwork status
Not on view at this time.

Artist Jeremy Blake discusses the role of art in times of conflict and reflects on the Winchester Mystery House, the eccentric San Jose mansion that inspired his Winchester (2002–4) trilogy.

Other Works by Jeremy Blake

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