Polaroid photography is one of those parts of analog life that Gen Z has decided to embrace, despite not being very good at it. As with wired headphones, the technology was impressive when it debuted, but unlike vinyl records, it has more drawbacks than benefits. Important to remember, too, is that when your favorite artists used Polaroids, they were doing so because they thought the medium was futuristic. Andy Warhol used to go to parties with his Big Shot and Blogs there’s a woman in 1980 who asks, “When are you going to Xerox with me, honey?”
“Lucas Samaras: Sitting, Standing, Walking, Looking” at the Art Institute of Chicago makes the case for Samaras (1936-2024) as one of the most inventive Polaroid-converted artists. Drawn primarily from the museum’s own collection, supplemented by recent gifts from the Samaras estate, the exhibition brings together selected works, paintings, and photographs along with more than 40 It also covers the arch from his earliest AutoPolaroids of 1969-70 to the large Sitting Tables of the late 1970s and his cropped Panoramas of the mid-1980s.
A standout piece from the show is Samara’s network AutoPolaroids (1969/70). These precede Cindy ShermanS ‘ Untitled Film Stills (1977) by a good margin and are seen as an influence, sharing their vivid exploration of identity as the artist dons wigs, make-up, expressions and props to conjure up a multitude of different black and white characters. But Polaroid offers a different flavor from Movie Stills. They were deeply troubled by the photograph, allegedly taken by people like Richard Prince AND Robert Longoand with Hollywood style design and framing. Samaras is more about that feeling of going crazy alone in your apartment.
Like AutoPolaroids, its Photo-Transformation 11/6/73 (1973) emphasized the strengths of the medium. Here, Samaras manipulates the 20 layers on a piece of Polaroid film with his fingers or a stylus in a performance that delivers something intense, damaged and surreal in the perfect way.
But New Yorkers are as interested in real estate as we are in transcendence. IN Peaceful life (1978), the artist captures the messy kitchen table in his studio. Paintbrushes are mixed with Café Bustelo, plants and a planning photo for the finished photograph that we now consider. This piece appeared after Polaroid’s invitation to test a new 8×10 camera. This larger format meant he couldn’t manipulate the emulsion as he did with the SX-70 prints, so Samaras had to make the transformation happen in front of the camera rather than in print. The result is a disembodied head that seems to roar, a wild jumble among all the others vying for your attention. It’s no wonder Peter Scheldahl called him the “artist laureate of narcissism.”
“Lucas Samaras: sitting, standing, walking, searching” is on view at the Art Institute of Chicago through July 20, 2026.
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