Thank You, Paine Webber
Since the early 1970s Haacke has taken on the intertwined political and corporate forces that use cultural patronage as a smokescreen to advance interests that are often antithetical to the vitality of free speech and expression in democracies. Haacke made this work just as the strategy of appropriation—lifting an image out of its original context and re-presenting it in critical fashion—began to make waves in the New York art world of the late 1970s. Like all effective appropriation, it exposes a prior instance of borrowing—in this case, how the investment firm Paine Webber used a documentary photograph to give its annual report the veneer of social concern. The artist then pointedly contrasted it with an image from the same annual report of a beaming trio of executives in a painting-lined gallery. As a counterpoint to the protestor’s signboard, Haacke dropped in text from a different Paine Webber ad campaign to show on whose backs the “risk management” is taking place—a biting indictment, the relevance of which has only increased since the recent economic downturn.
Artwork Details
- Title: Thank You, Paine Webber
- Artist: Hans Haacke (American and German, born Cologne, 1936)
- Date: 1979
- Medium: Gelatin silver print and silver dye bleach print
- Dimensions: 107.3 x 103.2 cm (42 1/4 x 40 5/8 in.), each
Frame: 109.2 × 104.8 cm (43 × 41 1/4 in.), each - Classification: Photographs
- Credit Line: Purchase, Vital Projects Fund Inc. Gift, through Joyce and Robert Menschel, 2010
- Object Number: 2010.416a, b
- Curatorial Department: Photographs
More Artwork
Research Resources
The Met provides unparalleled resources for research and welcomes an international community of students and scholars. The Met's Open Access API is where creators and researchers can connect to the The Met collection. Open Access data and public domain images are available for unrestricted commercial and noncommercial use without permission or fee.
To request images under copyright and other restrictions, please use this Image Request form.
Feedback
We continue to research and examine historical and cultural context for objects in The Met collection. If you have comments or questions about this object record, please complete and submit this form. The Museum looks forward to receiving your comments.