Premium Select [dickinson, Emily. (1830 - 1886)] Lesley Dill (american, B. 1950) I Think To Live May Be Bliss, 1998 And More [eaOJZDo3]

Platinum print. 4.75 x 4 inches (12.1 x 10.2 cm) (image). 7.5 x 5.5 inches (19 x 14cm). (sheet). Signed, titled, and dated in pencil, lower margin recto. The tender image features a nude male figure with a large collar inscribed with lines from Emily Dickinson, which begin...

I think to Live—may be a Bliss     
To those who dare to try—           
Beyond my limit to conceive—
My lip—to testify—

Overall excellent condition with no visible defects. Sheet is cornered to a 10.5 x 9 inch (27 x 23 cm) window mat, not framed.

Lesley Dill is one of the most prominent American artists working at the intersection of language and fine art. "In forging her art from language, Dill joins a tradition that spans Japanese haiga, which has married visual art with haiku for centuries… whose "truisms" projected on buildings read like profound tweets writ monumental. Dill has carved her own place in that lineage. Language is just a series of symbols imbued with the meaning and power we give them. In reading this, you affirm my arrangement of those symbols. We have a collective agreement. Dill's use of language seeks a different affirmation, a more private pact that doesn't require one necessarily to know a language, only to understand its intent." (Excerpt from Lennie Bennett for The Times)