Lorna Simpson
Easy to Remember
2000
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Lorna Simpson
Easy to Remember
2000
Physical Qualities
16 mm film transferred to digital video (black and white, sound), Duration: 2 minutes, 21 seconds
Credit Line
Collectors Circle Fund for Art by African Americans, and The Caplan Family Contemporary Art Fund
Object Number
2002.574
For this video, Lorna Simpson recorded 15 professional singers separately humming along to jazz saxophonist John Coltrane’s haunting interpretation of Rogers and Hart’s It’s Easy to Remember. Simpson then combined the recordings to create a choir of voices.
This layered tune becomes the soundtrack for a grid of moving images, each focused tightly on one singer’s lips. The individuality of each participant emerges in variations among the mouths, a part of the body integrally linked to expression and physicality. The video demonstrates that even within a collective experience, including one of songs and the emotions they conjure, independent voices persist and disrupt.
It’s Easy to Remember was made famous by Bing Crosby in 1935 and again by John Coltrane on his 1963 album Ballads. The lyrics are:
Your sweet expression
The smile you gave me
The way you looked when we met.
It’s easy to remember
But so hard to forget.
I hear you whisper
“I’ll always love you.”
I know it’s over, and yet,
It’s easy to remember
But so hard to forget.
So I must dream
To have your hand caress me,
Fingers press me tight.
I’d rather dream
Than have that lonely feeling
Stealing through the night.
Each little moment
Is clear before me
And though it brings me regret
It’s easy to remember
But so hard to forget.
The Baltimore Museum of Art by purchase, 2002; Sean Kelly Gallery, New York, New York
Christopher Bedford and Katy Siegel, BMA. "Every Day: Selections from the Collection," Sunday, July 14, 2019 - Sunday, January 05, 2020.
BMA, Black Box rotation, June 29 - August 31, 2014.
Contemporary Arts Museum, Houston, "Cinema Remixed," October 18, 2008 - January 2, 2009
The Huntington Museum of Art, "Video: Beyond the Frame." February 10, 2007 - April 22, 2007
The Baltimore Museum of Art, "The Art of Music from the Baltimore Museum of Art," circulated to Mansion at Strathmore, North Bethesda, Maryland, January 8, 2005 - February 26, 2005; The Washington Country Museum of Fine Arts, Hagerstown, Maryland, September 30, 2005 - November 20, 2005; The Academy Art Museum, Easton, Maryland, December 9, 2005 - February 5, 2006; Elizabeth Myers Mitchell Gallery, St. John's College, Annapolis, Maryland, February 15, 2006 - April 9, 2006
The College of Wooster Art Museum, Wooster, Ohio, "Lorna Simpson," August 29 - October 20, 2004; Walter E. Terhune Gallery, Owens Community College, Toledo, Ohio, November 6 - December 20, 2004.
Toulouse, France, 'Printemps de la Photographie,' September-October 2002. Weatherspoon Art Gallery, Greensboro, North Carolina, September 8-October 27, 2002.
Consorcio Salamanca 2002, Salamanca, Spain, 'Lorna Simpson,' April 25 - June 23, 2002.
Sean Kelly Gallery, New York, 'Lorna Simpson,' September 5 -October 20, 2001.
Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, 'Whitney Biennial 2002,' March 7 - May 26, 2002.
BMA, Black Box rotation, June 29 - August 31, 2014.
Contemporary Arts Museum, Houston, "Cinema Remixed," October 18, 2008 - January 2, 2009
The Huntington Museum of Art, "Video: Beyond the Frame." February 10, 2007 - April 22, 2007
The Baltimore Museum of Art, "The Art of Music from the Baltimore Museum of Art," circulated to Mansion at Strathmore, North Bethesda, Maryland, January 8, 2005 - February 26, 2005; The Washington Country Museum of Fine Arts, Hagerstown, Maryland, September 30, 2005 - November 20, 2005; The Academy Art Museum, Easton, Maryland, December 9, 2005 - February 5, 2006; Elizabeth Myers Mitchell Gallery, St. John's College, Annapolis, Maryland, February 15, 2006 - April 9, 2006
The College of Wooster Art Museum, Wooster, Ohio, "Lorna Simpson," August 29 - October 20, 2004; Walter E. Terhune Gallery, Owens Community College, Toledo, Ohio, November 6 - December 20, 2004.
Toulouse, France, 'Printemps de la Photographie,' September-October 2002. Weatherspoon Art Gallery, Greensboro, North Carolina, September 8-October 27, 2002.
Consorcio Salamanca 2002, Salamanca, Spain, 'Lorna Simpson,' April 25 - June 23, 2002.
Sean Kelly Gallery, New York, 'Lorna Simpson,' September 5 -October 20, 2001.
Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, 'Whitney Biennial 2002,' March 7 - May 26, 2002.
'Lorna Simpson.' Consorcio Salamanca 2002, Salamanca, Spain, 2002, p. 68.
'Whitney Biennial 2002.' Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, NY 2002, p. 202.
Griffiths, Paul. 'Where the Art Comes Through Loud if Not Clear,' 'The New York Times,' April 28, 2002, p. 36.
Princethal, Nancy. 'Whither the Whitney Biennial?', 'Art in America,' June 2002.
BMA Today: May / June 2003, pp. 3, ill.
"Mission Statement," Strategic Plan for The Baltimore Museum of Art, June 2003, ill.
"The Baltimore Museum of Art: Celebrating a Museum," The Baltimore Museum of Art, 2014, p. 269.
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