NEW SOCIETY: MIRANDA JULY’S FIRST SOLO MUSEUM EXHIBITION

Curated by Mia Locks, Miranda July: New Society spans three decades, from the early 1990s until today, including short film, performance, and installation works by American artist, filmmaker and writer Miranda July. The exhibition debuts a new work called F.A.M.I.L.Y. (Falling Apart Meanwhile I Love You), a multi-channel video installation featuring July’s yearlong collaboration with seven other performers via Instagram. The exhibition uses F.A.M.I.L.Y. as a jumping off point to consider related ideas from July’s other performative and collaborative works.

“I’m so honored and excited to not only share my newest work at the Fondazione Prada, but that it will be contextualized by past work from the last three decades,” remarks July. “That the museum is exhibiting my artworks at the Osservatorio and my films at Cinema Godard demonstrates a rare and special commitment to multiplicity.”

The first level of Osservatorio presents documentation from July’s earliest performances in punk clubs to major performance pieces, such as Love Diamond (1998–2000), The Swan Tool (2000–2003), Things We Don’t Understand and Definitely Are Not Going to Talk About (2006–2007), and New Society (2015), alongside related props, costumes and archival documents.

The second level presents F.A.M.I.L.Y., as well as two other collaborative projects—I’m the President, Baby (2018) and Services (2020). There will also be a reprisal of Learning to Love You More (2000-2007), a web-based project made in collaboration with Harrell Fletcher that included 70 assignments completed by the public and uploaded to the site. Assignment #43 (“Make an exhibition of the art in your parents’ home”) will appear as part of the exhibition, completed by a local Milanese woman specifically for the exhibition.

Miranda July: New Society is accompanied by the first complete retrospective of July’s filmography, which will take place at Fondazione Prada’s Cinema Godard concurrently with the show. The program includes three feature films, Me and You and Everyone We Know (2005), The Future (2011), and Kajillionaire (2020), and will be complemented by a selection of her short films and previously unreleased works.