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Perhaps unsurprisingly, every seat in the Tate’s Starr Cinema was taken on 16 July 2018, where Jenny Holzer was in conversation with Tate director Frances Morris With the rise of right-wing populism, fake news, and the West’s growing estrangement from ‘truth’ and objective fact, I sat alongside hundreds of others in silence, ready to embrace whatever insight Jenny Holzer could offer After all, Holzer was the one who told us back in the 80s that ‘ABUSE OF POWER COMES AS NO SURPRISE’ In dire times we, as always, turn to art and artists for answers   Holzer is a conceptual artist renowned for her politically-engaged, language-based installations A self-defined ‘outdoorsy’ (read: street) artist, Holzer first made a name for herself in the late 70s with Truisms; posters laden with aphorisms which were pasted in public view on the streets of New York Each Truism poster contained various clichés, slogans and mantras, so that each poster became a collection of diverse viewpoints For instance, one page from Truisms (Toronto), made in 1982, suggests that ‘POLITICS IS USED FOR PERSONAL GAIN’, that ‘PRIVATE PROPERTY CREATED CRIME’, and ‘THERE ARE TOO FEW IMMUTABLE TRUTHS TODAY’ Meanwhile, a different page from the series read ‘A STRONG SENSE OF DUTY IMPRISONS YOU’ while simultaneously suggesting ‘FREEDOM IS A LUXURY NOT A NECESSITY’ Ultimately, nothing added up There was no right or wrong statement, no completely correct assertion or utterly wrong declaration – even the artist herself didn’t necessarily stand behind all of the lines on the page But Holzer’s intention was to let the viewer’s subjective interpretation generate an emotional or intellectual response to the provoking statements In response to Morris asking why Holzer’s Truisms of the late 70s and early 80s tied together so many standpoints, Holzer said; ‘It was more accurate to offer a wealth of opinion’   The talk led the audience through Holzer’s entire body of work, including major undertakings such as her projection installations, which were shown in various cities across the globe including London, Rio de Janeiro, Singapore, Melbourne, and her native New York Much of the text used for the projections