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1985

Untitled (We will no longer be seen and not heard)

Barbara Kruger

American, born 1945

In this work Kruger invokes the aphorism “Children should be seen and not heard.” The children depicted here range from school-age youngsters to youthful adults whose gestures hint at—but do not literally make the sign language for— the words printed nearby. Some of the gestures in fact seem lewd, lending an aggressive tone to the generational and social dissent that the words and pictures suggest.

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