Nora Turato - you’re a fool the chalice is empty

Nora Turato
you’re a fool the chalice is empty, 2022
Two-color screenprint on Pure White French paper
23 1/4 x 16 3/8 inches (59.1 x 41.6 cm)
Framed: 28 x 20 1/4 x 3/4 inches (71.1 x 51.4 x 1.9 cm)
Edition of 30, 6 AP

Printed by Du-Good Press, New York
Published by 52 Walker, New York

The work of Amsterdam-based artist Nora Turato (b. 1991) boldly deploys text in various permutations to alchemize the onslaught of language in our contemporary moment and to challenge the continued dominance of the modernist vernacular in visual culture. Her oeuvre spans performance, video, graphic design, and wall work.

The text in the present work is set in Helvetica 52, a bespoke typeface that Turato created in collaboration with Jung-Lee Type Foundry and with consultation from Sabo Day for her 2022 solo exhibition, govern me harder, at 52 Walker. The custom font chaotically riffs on the clean, sans serif letters and characters of Helvetica, redrawing the paradigmatic typeface into bulging swoops and whorls that subvert the patrilineal legacy of modernist graphic design. The work’s title is taken from a line spoken in a horror series that the artist streamed on Netflix. Absurdist as the text appears to be, the work expresses moments of visual clarity to the viewer: Turato has long deployed the iconic design of cigarette packs and the sharply contrasting pop color palettes of logo and brand design in her text-based work. The nebulous expressions that Turato chooses are those that seep into the artist's consciousness, with all receiving equal weight in her performances and two-dimensional works.