Tonight, Nan Goldin—one of the great anti-artists of our time—will open her first solo exhibition in New York since 2007. Goldin has long been celebrated, and sometimes derided, for her highly intimate photographs of friends, lovers, and family (and various fashion figures), as well as her documentation of New York’s hard-living gay, transsexual and drugged-out denizens of the lower Bowery in the 70s and 80s, to whom she was introduced by her friend and fellow Boston native David Armstrong . And there was, usually, much overlap among those groups.

For her show, Scopophilia (the love of looking), the 58-year-old has paired 400 images from her career with photographs she took over the course of eight months in the Louvre in Paris. Goldin has said that by photographing various provocative paintings and sculptures in the museum—permission rarely granted—she hopes to bring the works back to life. The artist has also created a 25-minute film that juxtaposes these busty Baroques alongside contemporary portraiture to create a dialogue that merges the past with the present, and explores themes of love and desire.

Nan Goldin, Scopophilia, October 29 – December 23, 2011, Matthew Marks Gallery, 522 W 22 Street, New York, 10011