WASHINGTON, DC.- For the first time, all 100 photographs in acclaimed Brooklyn-based artist Janaina Tschäpe’s series 100 Little Deaths are on view together. Through January 20, 2020, the work can be seen at the National Museum of Women in the Arts in Washington, DC, along with 11 other photographers in Live Dangerously, an exhibition that challenges conventional, passive representations of the female form in nature. Live Dangerously also showcases work by Louise Dahl-Wolfe, Anna Gaskell, Dana Hoey, Graciela Iturbide, Kirsten Justesen, Justine Kurland, Rania Matar, Ana Mendieta, Laurie Simmons and Xaviera Simmons, women who use the female form as sculptural material positioning figures in natural surroundings to suggest provocative narratives.

Tschäpe will speak about her work at an event at NMWA on January 8, 2020, from 6:30-8:30 p.m.

Incorporating elements of aquatic, plant, and human life, Tschäpe’s universe of sublime forms shift between representation, fantasy and abstraction. Tschäpe began the 100 Little Deaths series in 1996 as an exploration of landscape, transmutation and death. Each self-portrait depicts the artist sprawled face down in different environments around the world, often with limbs akimbo. Tschäpe’s body appears in ancient ruins, manmade interiors, woodlands and bodies of water.

100 Little Deaths functions as the artist’s visual travel diary from 1996–2002. Tschäpe felt that each place she visited captured pieces of her, and she wanted to embody that emotion in her photography. Her prostrate form represents the powerful feeling of leaving a part of oneself behind somewhere. “It was the idea of me dying, or living a little history that was very short in every place,” Tschäpe said. Her photos vacillate between comedy and tragedy, making the series both surreal and theatrical.

Changing Landscapes: Tschäpe’s horizontal body becomes a part of the landscape as each location molds and changes her. Each photo is, in the artist’s words “…related to either new places I was living, or new places I was going to…I was really a landscape.” In Moais (2002), the towering Moai statues dwarf Tschäpe’s body. The neutral tones of her clothing blend into the rock and shadows; only the bright white of her shirt draws the eye to her presence. Tschäpe merges into the scene and loses herself to the massive statues before her in one of the most remote places in the world.

The transformation is reciprocal. Tschäpe constructs and changes the landscapes with her presence, just as these places change her. Frick Park (2000) presents the artist lying in fallen leaves on a wooded path. She has cleared away the fallen leaves next to her in the shape of her body. This outline doubles her presence and emphasizes her effect on the landscape. The leaves will never occupy that exact space again. Tschäpe forever alters the location—if only slightly—by being there.

Ocean Goddess: Many of Tschäpe’s “little deaths” take place in or near water, which may be a way for the artist to pay homage to her name and its connection to water. Tschäpe’s first name, Janaina, is derived from the name of an Afro-Brazilian sea goddess of the Candomblé religion. In Fiji (2002), Tschäpe lays perpendicular to the shoreline of a rocky beach. Her blue pants echo the blue of the water. The still line of her body directs the viewer’s eye to the ocean and the distant mountains that appear on the horizon.

Tschäpe’s “little deaths” represent the transmutation that occurs during her travels. Her prone figure negates her identity. This allows the artist to become a part of the landscape and represents the death of her old identity. The figure is not Tschäpe; it is her old self, left behind. Her new self continues on to her next location and next little death.

Janaina Tschäpe’s interdisciplinary practice spans painting, drawing, photography, video and sculpture. Born in 1973 in Munich, Germany, and raised in Sao Paolo, Brazil, Tschäpe received her Master in Fine Arts from the School of Visual Arts, New York. Her work has been exhibited in galleries and museums throughout the world, and is included in numerous public and private collections, including the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York; National Museum of Women in the Arts, Washington, D.C.; National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.; Centre Pompidou, Paris, France; Thyssen-Bornemisza Art Contemporary, Vienna, Austria; and Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, Madrid, Spain. Recent projects include CCBB Rio de Janeiro; Jeu de Paume, Paris; The 59th Minute with Creative Time in Times Square, New York; Fotomuseum Wintherthur, Switzerland; and The Irish Museum of Modern Art, Dublin.