ABOUT THE WORK

Isaac Julien’s set of LOVE HATE rings are editions the artist made for the Renaissance Society in 2003 as a special project conceived in dialogue with then-director Susanne Ghez. The rings are replicas–and an echo of the iconic rings in Spike Lee’s Do The Right Thing (1989)–of those worn by one of the main characters in Julien’s film Paradise Omeros, 2002. Set in the lush landscapes of Saint Lucia and industrial scenes of London’s East End, the film explores the impact of globalization on personal experience with its many emotional registers, partially signified in details such as these rings.

Reflecting the artist’s ongoing interest in symbols of power and cultural memory, the work engages assumptions about masculinity and gendered associations with sentimentality. Extending their significance in the film when the owner of these LOVE HATE rings wears them, this work introduces the reference to different contexts and engages with the cultural fantasies that are projected onto people and objects. The editioned object is contained within a suede-lined printed box.

Isaac Julien (b. 1960) is a London-based artist known for works in film and photography that explore fantasy, desire, and memory in relationship to ideas of selfhood and diasporic identities.