whitneymuseum:
Zoe Leonard wrote “I want a president” in 1992, in the lead-up to the presidential election. That year, the poet Eileen Myles ran for president as an independent candidate alongside George H. W. Bush, Bill Clinton, and Ross Perot. Originally written for QW, an independent queer magazine that dissolved before the text was published, it circulated organically among the artist’s friends. In 2006, on invitation from LTTR, Leonard contributed the text as a postcard insert. The work has subsequently reached a wide audience online and through books, magazines, and exhibitions. It has been translated into many languages and used in numerous public readings and performances in this country and abroad. See it now in the context of three decades of the artist’s work in Zoe Leonard: Survey.
[Zoe Leonard, I Want a President, 1992. Typewriting on paper, 21.6 x 35.6 cm / 8 ½ x 14 in. © Zoe Leonard Courtesy the artist and Hauser & Wirth]
