Untitled (America/Me)

Throughout his career, Glenn Ligon has pursued an incisive exploration of American history, literature, and society across a body of work that builds critically on the legacies of modern painting and conceptual art. He is best known for his landmark series of highly textured text-based paintings, which draw on the writings and speeches of diverse figures such as James Baldwin, Jean Genet, Zora Neale Hurston, Gertrude Stein, Walt Whitman, and Richard Pryor. Ligon’s practice also encompasses photography, print, installation, video, and sculpture, the latter often made of neon lettering affixed to the wall. Both politically provocative and formally rigorous, his work lays bare issues around history, language, and identity.

For the High Line, Ligon presents Untitled (America/Me), a new 25 x 75-foot billboard featuring an altered image of his iconic 2008 neon, Untitled, which stretches 14 feet across and features the word “AMERICA” in neon capital letters that flicker on and off. Made at a critical juncture in United States history, as Barack Obama was set to become the first African American president, the work’s flickering lights allude to both the optimism and ambivalence of the moment. Untitled seems to be struggling to function—just as likely to completely break and shut off as it is to flicker on and stay alight.

In 2022, Ligon revisited Untitled, presenting Untitled (America/Me). For this work, the artist manipulated a photograph of his 2008 neon, drawing thick black X’s over the majority of the letters, leaving only the “M” and “E” visible—spelling the word “ME.” By returning to his earlier work, which at the time served as a reflection on the current state and potential future of America, Ligon effectively checks in with an update. Untitled (America/Me) demonstrates the increasingly complex relationship between the individual and society as experienced in the United States. The celebration of “rugged individualism” is a foundational element of the American ethos, originating with the early exploration of the American Frontier. However, this belief comes at a cost—as Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. noted in his 1968 speech “The Other America”: “…this country has socialism for the rich, rugged individualism for the poor.” Noam Chomsky similarly explored this concern in his 2020 book, Rugged Individualism and the Misunderstanding of American Inequality. Ligon’s work continues in this critical tradition, highlighting a seemingly self-focused population, driven by a “me first” mentality, and an increasing disregard for community and others.

The artist has worked with the word “America” in several installations. As Ligon says, “Paint is a material. Language is a material. Neon is a material. I’m interested in playing with that word [“America”] as material. So to cross it out, to invert it, to put it upside down or to make it blink off and on obnoxiously is all a way of playing with this word that we think we all know what it means.” Adjacent to the High Line, soaring over 10th Avenue and the new 18th Street Plaza, Untitled (America/Me) encourages reflection and captures the attention of pedestrians at street level and park-goers on the High Line alike.