RECENT ACADEMIC ABSTRACTIONS, 1982

Janet Olivia Henry’s Recent Academic Abstractions, depicts a moment from Henry’s time in the 1990s drumming with Women’s Action Coalition (WAC), a feminist art-activist collective. The 45-inch by 45-inch diorama takes the shape of a multiroom building, inspired by Phyllis Kind’s gallery where the WAC Drums Corp rehearsed. Henry designed the space from equal parts memory and imagination. Using dolls, action figures, LEGOs, and other miniatures, Henry constructs a lively scene: A busy table hosts cupcakes and water bottles for over a dozen figures dressed up in leather jackets, pink faux fur, metallic shoulder pads, and all manner of art world finery, drums in hand. Storerooms are stuffed with tools and blueprints and a scaled-down replica of Duchamp’s urinal. A banner (drawn by comic book letterer Janice Chiang) lies half-painted. In one room, we find a miniaturized version of David Hammons’s Day’s End (2014–21) and a Louise Nevelson sculpture. In another, a display with busts of Wagner and Bach. A dog howls by a dumpster. Another snoozes in the office.

Dimensions: 37¼ x 12 x 11¾ in. (94.61 x 30.48 x 29.84 cm)