Historical works and a new site-specific installation trace Joseph Kosuth’s ongoing engagement with language and meaning.
By The Arts Editorial Team
Opening March 28, Sean Kelly, the renowned New York art gallery, presents a new exhibition of works by the pioneering conceptual artist Joseph Kosuth. Provocatively titled The-exchange-value-of-language-has-fallen-to-zero, the exhibition explores over fifty years of Kosuth’s oeuvre, alongside a new installation that poignantly examines philosophical debates surrounding language, context, and meaning. Conceived specifically for the space at Casa dei Tre Oci in Venice, Italy, the exhibition opens with a large-scale neon installation, “A Chain of Resemblance” (2026), based on a text by French philosopher Michel Foucault. Additionally, seminal works produced during the Art & Language movement of the late 1960s and 1970s are on view, including *“*One and Three Mirrors” (1965), *“*The Fifth Investigation” (1969), and *“*Text/Context” (1978–79). These foundational works have arguably informed the framework of conceptual art.
Like many artists who came before him, Venice has served as a base and for Kosuth since 2021; however, his ties to the ancient city extend much further back. He has participated in eight editions of the Venice Biennale, including representing the Hungarian Pavilion in 1993. Additionally, his work “The Material of Ornament” has been housed at the Fondazione Querini Stampalia since 1997, *while “*To Invest Relations (For Carlo Scarpa)” was commissioned for the 2016 Architecture Biennale and is permanently installed in the Mario Baratto Lecture Hall at Università Ca’ Foscari in Venice.
Open through November 22, The-exchange-value-of-language-has-fallen-to-zero arrives at a moment of heightened relevance, as artificial intelligence and the rise of large language models further contextualize the foundational practices of Art & Language. For additional information, visit berggruenarts.org.