Taryn Simon’s latest exhibition, *Father Country I Do Love You*, marks a significant milestone as the first solo photography-based show to debut new work in the Guggenheim Museum’s iconic spiral rotunda. Opening in late September 2026, it is also the largest debut exhibition of new work the museum has ever staged. The project, developed over a decade, weaves together themes of espionage, memory, and personal history through an extensive investigation anchored by correspondence with a retired federal agent.
Simon, a New York-based artist known for blending photography, text, installation, and performance, approaches her work with meticulous research and archival insight. For *Father Country*, she traces the convoluted stories orbiting one intermediary figure embedded in espionage and clandestine activity. Drawing from the agent’s life and various connected individuals—ranging from innocent witnesses to participants in covert operations—she constructs a layered narrative described by Simon as “built almost like a novel,” with color-coded chapters featuring first-person narratives penned in the agent’s voice.
The exhibition includes a wide range of elements, from photographic portraits collaged into abstract patterns to archival materials and interactive installations. Simon incorporates performances by professional mourners, a cold plunge experience in the gallery, and even a voting machine. Through these multi-sensory components, she explores the intersections of personal and political histories.
Simon’s intimate relationship with the material is underscored by personal reflections threaded throughout the exhibition. The title and some narrative elements derive from Simon’s own family history; her father, a former U.S. government employee, lived in Thailand during the mysterious 1967 disappearance of silk entrepreneur Jim Thompson. Simon recreated Thompson’s famous wood-paneled living room first on Long Island and later in the Guggenheim lobby, using painstaking craftsmanship to simulate teak wood. The project is dedicated to Simon’s father, who was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease during the final stages of its development.
The work’s complexity is amplified by moments of personal vulnerability. Simon herself sometimes appears as a figure within the project, depicted in dossier-like texts that recount her experiences, including a photoshoot incident involving Department of Defense property and correspondence with figures connected to the DC sniper case. The exhibition culminates in a chapter addressing memory loss, framed by the agent’s bout with transient global amnesia on Election Day 2020 and Simon’s own familial experiences of memory’s fragility.
Simon’s artistic journey spans 25 years and is marked by deep explorations of information systems, genealogy, and the unseen corners of American power and culture. Her earlier works include *The Innocents*, which examined wrongful convictions through photography, and projects involving the cataloguing of seized contraband, botanical specimens linked to international treaties, and bloodline investigations involving figures such as the first female airplane hijacker.
*Father Country I Do Love You* remains on view at the Guggenheim Museum in New York through March 14, 2027, presenting an ambitious confluence of investigative art, personal narrative, and historical inquiry.