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WOW – Work of the Week – INVADER, Hypnosis

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Invader
Hypnosis
2011
Woodcut
9 7/8 x 11 7/8 in.
Artist’s Proof, edition of 50
Pencil signed, numbered and dated

About This Work:

“Little by little, I organized a detailed process by which I explore international densely populated urban areas and “invade” them.”

Invader is the pseudonym of a French urban artist, born in 1969, whose work is modeled on the crude pixellation of 1970s–1980s 8-bit video games. He took his name from the 1978 arcade game Space Invaders, and much of his work is composed of square ceramic tiles inspired by video game characters.

Although he prefers to remain incognito, and guards his identity carefully, his distinctive creations can be seen in many highly-visible locations in more than 75 cities in 33 countries. He documents each intervention in a city as an “Invasion”, and has published books and maps of the location of each of his street mosaics.

Invader likes tiles for their robustness and permanence.  Video games of the era were constructed with 8-bit graphics, and so it lends themselves well to the mosaic treatment, with each tile representing one pixel.

“In my own eyes, they are the perfect icons of our time, a time where digital technologies are the heartbeat of our world. As these creatures are made of pixels they are in some sorts ready-made for tile reproduction. Finally, their names are literally predestined for the project I have pioneered: they are “Space Invaders!”

Invader’s idea is to bring the virtual world into reality.  He sees himself as a hacker of public space, spreading a virus of mosaics;[the streets are his canvas, his invasions are gifts to the city and its people. One can see many things in it, but it refers to the early days of digital and the video game.

His first mosaic was installed in the mid 1990s in his home city. It was a sleeper for several years before the full “invasion” program was conceived in 1996.  This was the first wave of the “invasion”.  By 1998, it had spread to 31 other cities in France.

Today, 77 cities have been invaded, 2,692 Space Invaders placed comprising some 1.5 million ceramic tiles; 19 invasion maps have been published.  He has invaded New York five times, Miami twice, and Hong Kong on three separate occasions.

This week’s Work of the Week (WOW) is called Hypnosis.

In this work, Invader channels the work of the Norwegian painter and printmaker, Edvard Munch.  Munch was greatly influenced by the German Expressionists in the early 20th century.  Many artist in this genre used the woodblock process in print form, to capture the angst of the times.

Hypnosis is a woodblock print done is Munch’s German Expressionist style. Here we see Munch’s typical figure and his familiar wavy lined background. The work is very dark, as is the work of the German Expressionists.  We see the effects of war through the eyes of these artists.

Here is where Invader starts to have fun with this work.  He uses the dark, depressed like image of Munch’s work, and inputs his space invader figures  making this work fun. However, upon further examination, we see the play on the idea that the space invaders are invading these villagers or the village.

This is, and has always been his concept, THE INVASION.  This is a great example of an extreme and obvious invasion.

WOW – Work Of the Week – John Baldessari “Large Door”

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Hegel s Cellar Portfolio - Large Door

John Baldessari
Large Door
1986
Photogravure and aquatint on torn Rives BFK aper
20 x 38 in.
Edition of 35
Pencil signed and numbered

About This Work:

“Fingerprints and footprints can be repeated, and that’s why I make prints endlessly”  – John Baldessari

John Baldessari has created a formidable body of editions and artist’s books in his lifetime. His irreverent and playful prints require an intellectual workout as rigorous as any other medium in which he chooses to work.

A self-described “failed writer” who “builds with images the way a writer builds with words”, Baldessari’s work is concerned with the idea of visual information as signifier and a means of communication, combining stock imagery, colors, and text to create intricate and taut visual ambiguities. His aim is to create enough “tension” between found images in order to illicit questions and curiosity.

Using found photographs as source material – primarily stock images from early Hollywood films, newspaper photographs, and postwar advertising –  Baldessari was drawn to the generic nature of such images, their role in creating a shared visual culture, and the power they have to reveal subconscious thoughts and uncover the viewer’s “emotional baggage”.

In 1986, Baldessari created a series of 10 prints, to do just that. This series, entitled Hegel’s Cellar, used stock imagery in montages to examine Hegel’s theory of an “abyss (or cellar) as a psychic space where one preserve[s] images unconsciously” (Wendy Weitman in The Prints of John Baldessari: A Catalogue Raisonne 1971–2007, pp. 23-24).

The idea was brought out while Baldessari was in psychotherapy at the time, and he had started to let emotion (but not his own emotions) into his work. The presence of fear, anxiety, lust, horror, and other states was a new element, but their frequently jarring context was not; he was on the lookout for the unexpected associations generated by random images in close proximity.

This week’s Work Of the Week (WOW) is Large Door, from Hegel’s Cellar.

Faced with the dilemma or option of either being killed or stepping into the abyss, represented by a large black rectangle of equal proportion as the men on both sides carrying pistols, Baldessari is challenging the viewer to fill in the blanks.

WOW – Work Of the Week – Shepard Fairey “Ramone Canvas”

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Ramone Canvas

Shepard Fairey
Ramone Canvas
2002
Screenprint on canvas
24 x 18 in.
Artist’s Proof (A.P.)
Pencil signed and numbered

About This Work:

“Most of my heroes don’t appear on stamps or in art galleries.  No matter how much I love art, or try to convince myself of its relevance in society the fact remains that music is a lot cooler and way more able to reach people’s hearts and minds”  – Shepard Fairey

Music has always had a huge influence on pop culture. Every generation had a defining genre of music.  Music, like art speaks volumes about the times in which we live in. Just as art, music is constantly changing.  Shepard Fairey’s brand of art is Street Art. Real street art touches upon the pulse of the everyday person, whose perception of what art is about is not in a museum, but rather on the street. Music touches the everyday person, much like the street art of Shepard Fairey and his contemporaries.

Society emulates musicians, society hums their music, society sings their lyrics. Fairey’s art is an extension of what music does to society. His work talks about the social, environmental, political, and every day issues that concern the everyday person.

His work became more widely known in the 2008 U.S. presidential election, specifically his Barack Obama “Hope” poster. The New Yorker art critic Peter Schjeldahl called the poster “the most efficacious American political illustration since ‘Uncle Sam Wants You‘”.

This week’s Work Of the Week (WOW) is a very rare silkscreen on canvas of one of Shepard Fairey’s favorite Punk Rock icons, Joey Ramone. The Ramone Canvas as it has come to be known, was done in 2002. There are only 2 of these pieces ever made, plus 1 AP (artist’s proof) and 1 PP (printer’s proof).

Needless to say, this work is extremely rare.

In 2002 – 2003 Fairey produced a Punk Pioneers suite. The first piece of this series was Joey Ramone, lead singer of the Ramones. Despite others that had come before him setting the stage for the punk rock genre, such as Iggy Pop or the Stooges, the Ramones, according to Fairey “really set the wheels in motion” in the realm of punk music.

The other icons in Punk Pioneers suite are Johnny Rotten, Joe Strummer, Glenn Danzig, Henry Rollins, and Ian MacKaye. However, the only work on canvas was of Joey Ramone. All the other icons were silkscreen on paper and in an edition of 300.

The whereabouts of the 2 editioned Ramone Canvas are unknown. The printer’s proof has been found, and archived, but has a tear to the canvas. Thus, leaving the Artist’s Proof left, which belongs to Gregg Shienbaum Fine Art, the only known work in mint condition.

WOW – Work Of the Week – Mel Ramos “Zebra”

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Zebra 2

Mel Ramos
Zebra
1979
6 color lithograph
25 1/2 x 20 1/2 in.
Edition of 250
Pencil signed and numbered

About This Work:

Mel Ramos (born 1935) has been an American Pop master of the erotic nude female figure since the 1960’s. Mr. Ramos’ art captures the enticing ideals of femininity through bright saturated colors in the aesthetics of pin-up magazines and famous nude paintings from art history. As many of his Pop artist contemporaries, Mel Ramos started his career in commercial art, making neon signs and also took courses in typography. Under the wing of his mentor, Wayne Thiebaud, Mel Ramos eventually dedicated himself fully to fine art. 

Wonder Woman, Sheena – Queen of the Jungle, Camilla, Roma, Cave Girl, and Nile Queen were the female inspirations for the artist. Strong women from distant times and exotic places endowed with magical powers and overt physical charm were the heroines of body of work. 

As his East Coast contemporaries, the artist also featured the branding of products and advertising in his works, addressing American post war consumerism but in a lighter, more playful manner. The woman figure, however, always remained the centerpiece and focus of the paintings. 
Mel Ramos’ first solo exhibition took place at Bianchini Gallery in 1964 and soon thereafter, in 1967 had his first museum show at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. 

In 1979, the artist produced a series of fine art lithographs based on a suite of “Animal Paintings”, which depicted a nude woman with an animal. In each of these paintings, the artist chose strong, exotic, and erotic animals, such as a rhinoceros, curassow or ocelot to feature alongside the nude female.

This week’s Work Of the Week is entitled Zebra, and it was part of the “Animal Paintings” suite. It is a fine example of the playful imagery of Mel Ramos’ work. A sexy,  young, nude woman sits atop a zebra, looking directly at the viewer. Her hairstyle, yellow ribbon and tan lines add to the cheekiness of the image and also depict a more innocent era in which women were more coy and demure, leaving more to the imagination. The later works of Mel Ramos are more revealing and “in your face,” which reflect the shift of society’s acceptance of a more sexualized culture today.
The charm of the artist’s earlier work bring us back to a more innocent, nostalgic, flirtatious time. 

WOW – Work Of the Week – Banksy “Grannies”

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Grannies close up

Banksy
Grannies
2006
Screenprint
19 3/4 x 27 1/2 in.
Edition of 150
Pencil signed and numbered; accompanied with COA by PEST Control

About This Work:

Banksy is a British street artist and activist who, despite worldwide fame, has maintained anonymity. Although details of the artist’s life are largely unknown, it is thought that Banksy was born in Bristol more or less around 1974, and started his career in this city as a graffiti artist. 

Whether plastering cities with his trademark gangsta rat, painting imagined openings and building hotels in the West Bank barrier in Israel, or stenciling “we’re bored of fish” above a penguins’ zoo enclosure, Banksy creates street art with an irreverent wit and an international reputation that precedes his anonymous identity. “TV has made going to the theatre seem pointless, photography has pretty much killed painting” he says, “but graffiti has remained gloriously unspoilt by progress”.

Banksy’s work features striking and humorous images, occasionally combined with slogans. The message is usually anti-war, anti-capitalist or anti-establishment. Subjects often include rats, apes, policemen, soldiers, children, and the elderly.
As all Banksy fans know, the artist can be extremely edgy, political, satirical, and in the case of this Work Of the Week, Grannies, humorous as well. A humor that plays upon the evident contrast and contradiction that lays in the image of two old, extremely British ladies knitting sweaters that say PUNK IS NOT DEAD or THUG FOR LIFE.

Banksy’s works need no explanation. Through his crafted signature and his immediately identifiable graphic style, he critically examines contemporary issues of consumerism, political authority, terrorism, and the status of art and its display. Grannies is another perfect example of how Banksy’s work can be thought-provoking, intense, shocking, intriguing and funny.

WOW – Work Of the Week – James Rosenquist “Marilyn”

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Marilyn stock

James Rosenquist
Marilyn
1974
Lithograph
41 3/4 x 29 1/2 in.
Edition of 75
Pencil signed, titled, dated and numbered

About This Work:

With the recent passing of James Rosenquist, Gregg Shienbaum Fine Art is dedicating this week’s Work Of the Week to the icon and pioneer of Pop Art. 

James Rosenquist started his career as a sign painter of commercial billboards, which is often reflected in his large-scale paintings through a flat, uniform, and graphic style. Much of his inspiration was drawn from the advent of large-scale advertising and mass media. The bright hues and precise renderings convey the new, clean, and sterile environments so often used in advertising. However, while on the surface, his works appear to suggest the American Dream of the 1950’s and 1960’s, an underlining message addresses the potential issues American society will confront, and be confronted with, during this emergence of the thriving economy of the postwar.  

One of Mr. Rosenquist’s most famous painting, F-111 is an 86-foot-long commentary on the duality of Americana in 1965 at the height of the Vietnam War. 23 panels juxtaposed a mushroom cloud, a smiling girl, a bomber jet, a beach umbrella, among others. Debuting at the Leo Castelli Gallery in NYC, the piece caused a sensation in the art world. 

Another well-known work is Marilyn Monroe I. Measuring 7’ 9” x 6’ ¼”, this large-scale oil and spray enamel on canvas is a tribute to the sex symbol, created shortly after her sudden death in 1962. Through this work, Rosenquist took upon himself to share with his viewers a more sophisticated message – one that consisted of more than the usual glamourous image of Marilyn Monroe so many artists have utilized. The imagery we are so accustomed to associate with the movie star was transformed, and Rosenquist chose to present her in a manner that denied the immediate recognition, while preserving her coquettishness. One must observe the piece very closely to understand who it is the viewer is confronted with. Monroe’s face is divided into six panes removing her instant recognition, however, Rosenquist demonstrates a unique ability to transmit her spirit. All of Monroe’s features, her eyes, lips and hand, have been fragmented and placed together in an incoherent manner, with bold lettering painted on top in the same disjointed configuration. 

Clearly visible, but also in a fragmented manner, is the Coca-Cola logo, but on closer inspection, overlaying letters of Marilyn Monroe’s name also become apparent. James Rosenquist, being very familiar with the force of branding, mass-production and popular culture, was able to draw attention to the idea that Marilyn Monroe was as important to commercialism and industry as any every day products such as Coca-Cola, drawing upon the message beyond her as a person, but as Marilyn Monroe packaged in the mass media and marketed based on her sex appeal. Rosenquist’s painting of Marilyn Monroe is one of countless others painted by his contemporaries, including Andy Warhol and Willem de Kooning, that attest to the increasing power of mass media and its impact on art production during the 1960’s.

The Marilyn lithograph became available in 1974 and was published by Petersburg Press Inc. in an edition of 75. It is housed in the MoMA and Tate, among many other prominent collections. 

Rosenquist was born in 1933 and passed away in New York City on March 31st 2017 after an illustrious career, which cemented him as one of the most important and influential American artists of our time. 

 

WOW – Work Of the Week – Frank Stella “Sinjerli Variation IV”

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Sinjerli Variation IV

Frank Stella
Sinjerli Variation IV
1977
Lithograph and screenprint
32 x 42 1/2
Edition of 100
Pencil signed and numbered

About This Work:

Frank Stella (b. 1936), an American minimalist and geometric abstract expressionist is known for producing works emphasizing the picture as object rather than as representation. He has said: “a picture is a flat surface with paint on it – nothing more.” Stella’s works do not have a clear reference to the world, they are compositions of the basics of the elements of art and geometry. Color, line, and form are what inspire him. 

The Sinjerli Variation Series of six lithographs, was published in 1977 by Petersburg Press in New York, seven years after the artist’s first retrospective at MoMA. Aged 41, at the time, he was the youngest artist to receive such an honor. 

The Sinjerli Series is derived from Stella’s original painting Sinjerli I of the Protractor Series, dated from 1967 to 1970. The inspiration of the Protractor Series, in addition to the names of the works, came from the circular shape of cities from the ancient civilizations of Asia Minor. Sinjerli was a city of the Ancient Anatolian people of the Hittite Empire, which reached its height in the 14th century BC. It is located at the foothills of the Anti-Taurus Mountains of southern Turkey. The fortified citadel of Sinjerli was outlined by an almost perfect double walled circle, which connected with the geometric inspiration of Stella’s body of work.

Each Sinjerli variation is composed of two semi-circles, or protractors and positioned to the left of the sheet, slightly lower than midlevel. Each lithograph is composed of elaborate patterns of intersecting circular forms, arranged in a manner that removes any indication of depth. While at first, the form is seemingly symmetrical, the interweaving of the arcs also gives the illusion of unending line-work. 

For the series, Stella made use of bright and vibrant colors. The hues are not tinted as a flat application, but rather have a painterly texture and this result was accomplished by a three-step process. The first step required the deposition of a toned ground, the result of a broadly drawn plate, also known as “full crayon.” Secondly, a looser, textured drawing was applied, the “smear crayon.” Finally, the finishing touch was a high gloss glaze, named “loose crayon.”

Today, Frank Stella continues to live and work in Manhattan and commutes to his studio in Rock Tavern, NY on the weekdays. His most recent retrospective took place at the Whitney in NYC from October 30, 2015 to February 7, 2016.

WOW – Work Of the Week – Claes Oldenburg “Geometric Mouse Scale E Desktop”

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Geo Mouse

Claes Oldenburg
Geometric Mouse Scale E “Desktop”
2013
Painted aluminum sculpture on painted aluminum base
6 1/2 x 8 1/4 x 6 1/2 in.
Edition of 50
Signed and numbered in ink on base

About This Work:

Claes Oldenburg is an American sculptor, best known for his public art installations typically featuring very large replicas of everyday objects. 
Born in 1929 in Sweden, Oldenburg spent much of his adolescence in the United States, before moving permanently to New York in 1956. Oldenburg studied at the Art Institute of Chicago and subsequently started his career in New York City, where he used to participate in the array of happenings that began to take place in the late 1950’s.

Many of Oldenburg’s works depict ‘mundane’ objects and, at first, they were ridiculed before being accepted by the art world – but they were also defined “brilliant”, due to the reaction that the pop artist brought to a ‘tired’ abstract expressionist period.
Oldenburg first orders his impressions of the world through sketches and writings in his ever-present notebooks; then he creates models and drawings form another layer of thinking.

The purpose of Oldenburg’s art is to uncover the mystery and power of commonplace objects by morphing their scale, shape, and texture, embracing what he calls “the poetry of everywhere”. As source of inspiration, the artist always uses things made and utilized by human beings. Used, out-of-date or simply banal, they look rescued from oblivion by the artist. While recreating objects, Oldenburg alters their specifics, transforming them through changes in material, scale, context and exaggerations of forms that lend them more than one identity. 

This week’s Work Of the Week, Geometric Mouse Scale E “Desktop”, is a great example of Oldenburg’s personal way of making art.
The source of inspiration for making this mouse is an old movie camera. The mouse form is combined with that of an old movie camera, whose square box and two circular film spools mimic his face and ears, while the grip is the nose of the mouse.

As in Oldenburg’s other artworks, this image blends high and low art, but is more personal. The artist has even suggested that the Geometric Mouse is his alter ego, stating that he first took the subject of the mouse from one of the most iconic and popular characters ever: Mickey Mouse. The mouse is an extremely recurring subject in Oldenburg’s body of work. It is considered his artistic symbol par excellence, for his typical humor and use of obsolete objects and iconic characters as main source.

The concept/name of the mouse ‘desktop‘ also plays on the concept of fast paced movement toward technology in today’s world, but is a nod to the past of how fast the world is actually moving. The Desktop Mouse can also be seen by today’s generation as a play on a computerized mouse on the old style green mouse pads. A mouse on a mouse pad.

By deforming and decontextualizing the object, Claes Oldenburg helps it to become estranged, so that we are finally able to look at it in a different perspective: as a work of art. This happens because the artist believes that this object possesses a certain aesthetic quality, stemming from its appearance, and therefore displays it for the appreciation of others.

Oldenburg has said himself that “If I didn’t think what I was doing had something to do with enlarging the boundaries of art, I wouldn’t go on doing it“.

To watch the video of Claes Oldenburg explaining the Geometric Mouse, click on the image below:

mouse

WOW – Work Of the Week – Robert Longo “Men In The Cities”

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Untitled

Robert Longo
Untitled, from Men In The Cities
1993
Lithograph
22 5/8 x 14 1/8 in.
Hors Commerce (H.C.) of 5
Pencil signed and numbered

About This Work:

Robert Longo was born in 1953 in Brooklyn, New York and raised in Long Island. 
This multi-faceted multi-talented artist has shot films, music videos and cut records, working with a variety of media. Yet, his most well known body of work is Men In The Cities, a series of graphite and charcoal drawings of smartly dressed men and women that he started in 1979. 

Although Longo extensively studied sculpture during his years as an art student, drawing remains his favorite form of expression. The sculptural influence prevails in his drawing technique, as his “portraits” have a distinctive chiseled line that seems to give his drawings a three-dimensional quality.

Longo had a childhood fascination with mass media: movies, television, magazines, and comic books, which continue to influence his art to this day.
The idea for this series came from a still image in Rainer Werner Fassbinder’s neo-noir film The American Soldier (1935), in which a hired assassin does away with a number of undesirables. One gets shot in the back and Longo was intrigued with the body position when shot. Thus the Men In The Cities concept was born. 

About four years passed before Longo turned the vision of a man shot in the back into a monumental series of drawings. He produced about 60 Men In The Cities between 1979 and 1982. Taking in also the rock star poses popularized by music videos of the 1980’s, the preppy men’s clothing and the rise of Wall Street, these pictures embody the spirit of the age in a way that few works ever manage to.

Fascinated by the arrested gestures of the figure, which reminded him of the spasmodic movements of punk musicians and fans, to achieve these gestures, Longo invited his friends to the rooftop of his Manhattan apartment, tied ropes around them, and pummeled them with tennis balls and other objects and made them over-react to loud noises, while he photographed their reactive movements. The images were then projected on to paper, and Longo drew over them in great detail.

Those friends included the fellow fine artist Cindy Sherman and Larry Gagosian. Today, both Sherman and Gagosian are towering figures within the art world, yet 35 years ago their future, as well as Longo’s, was far from assured. “Robert shot us in free fall, looking like we were dead” Sherman recalled in 2009. “A feeling of force and energy emanates from these photographs. Now I see their choreographic aspect. I see youthful optimism. Creating these poses became a sort of dance, and I think that’s why I remember having such a good time”.

These aggressive movements of men and woman in business attire, have an elegance and grace that is entirely unexpected. They are protective reactions and exaggerated gestures that have here been turned into a choreography, a ballet, if you will. The movements are fresh and vital, full of energy and life. They document an essence of human motion, boiled down to pure expression.