Kathryn Andrews

Employing props, costumes and other movie collectibles, the LA artist deconstructs presidential elections, gender relations, and the mechanisms of cultural desire.

- Jonathan Griffin

In Fall 2014, “Donald Trump For President” was less than a whisper on the wind. When, around that time, the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, invited Kathryn Andrews to mount an exhibition for November of the following year, she hit upon the idea of using the US presidential election as a thematic narrative to structure a minisurvey of her sculptures, wall works and installations from the past five years. Clowns were to feature prominently.

It was not until March 2015 that Trump officially announced that he was exploring the possibility of running for president. In August, Kanye West promised that he would run in 2020. By the time November rolled around, Andrews’ exhibition—which opened with a giant, wallpapered photograph of Bozo the Clown announcing his presidential bid in 1984—seemed strikingly prescient.

West and Trump, however, were only ghosts at the feast of “Run For President,” Andrews’ Chicago exhibition, which travelled this September to the Nasher Sculpture Center in Dallas where it will run until January 8, 2017, two days after the Vice President has formally announced POTUS #45. Rather, “Run For President” casts back to other entertainer-politicians such as Ronald Reagan and Arnold Schwarzenegger, as well as those non-white or non-male figures— Dick Gregory or Shirley Chisholm, for instance—who tested the American myth that anyone can make it to the White House.