Scene of the Crime

Due in large part to the bombing of the Oklahoma City Federal Building, the crash of TWA Flight 800, and the O.J. Simpson trial, the once-arcane field of forensics has taken hold of the popular imagination. This text which accompanies an exhibition of the same name organized by UCLA at the Armand Hammer Museum and supported by the Fellows of Contemporary Art, considers the art object as a kind of forensic evidence. Like the chalk outline of a murdered body, certain works of art invoke off-screen drama, prior trauma, or a history redolent of criminality, violation, or mysterious turbulence. From the evidentiary traces presented in these exhibits, the viewer is prompted to reconstruct behaviour, motivations, and events. This forensic approach emphasizes the viewer's role as investigator while underscoring the cluelike and contingent status of the art object.