* 1929 in Stockholm, Sweden. Lives and works in New York, USA
American artist
Known for large-scale sculptures in public space replicating everyday objects (e.g. garden hose, lipstick, matches); assemblages of simple materials (e.g. papier–mâché ) or waste products, and "soft sculptures" series.
Art historical context: Pop Art, Happening
Exhibited works
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Proposed Underground Memorial and Tomb for President John F. Kennedy, 1965. 1st | B | Pencil, spray enamel, collage, 43.7 x 33.7 cm. Before creating his gigantic monuments for everyday objects, Oldenburg proposed a colossal yet invisible memorial: his Proposed Underground Memorial and Tomb for President John F Kennedy was a hypothetical (hollow) statue of the assassinated President, a kind of anti-monument with the size of the Statue of Liberty. Based on a photograph of JFK, the statue should be buried head-down in the ground, as if to suggest that Kennedy’s murder had turned the American dream on its head. The idea of evoking tragedy through absence later became a major feature of commemorative projects for the Holocaust and civil violence. | |
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Placid Civic Monument, 1967. 1st | B |
| 108 cubic feet of Central Park was excavated and reinserted northwest of "Cleopatra's Needle," behind the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The work was made for the exhibition "Sculpture in Environment," October 1–31, 1967. Collection Gift to New York City from Claes Oldenburg. The work was entitled Placid Civic Monument, but referred to as the Hole or Burial Monument by Oldenburg in his notes. On October 1, 1967, gravediggers hired by Claes Oldenburg worked from 10:30 a.m. until 12:30 p.m. to create a hole adhering to the dimensions of a human grave. The event took place in Central Park behind the Metropolitan Museum of Art. After a lunch break, the excavation was refilled and smoothed over. It was interpreted as a "grave for dead art," "a wounded virgin," and a "trench," among other things. "By not burying a thing the dirt enters into the concept, and little enough separates the dirt inside the excavation from that outside … so that the whole park and its connections, in turn enter into it. Which meant that my event is merely the focus for me of what is sense, or in the corner of a larger field". (Claes Oldenburg) |
| Links Oldenburgvanbruggen.com | Pace Gallery | Margo Leavin Gallery | Paula Cooper Gallery | Guggenheim Museum | Further informations 1 | 2 | 3
Credits All reproductions are courtesy of the artist © Claes Oldenburg; photography on Placid Civic Monument: Daniel McPartlin/New York City Parks Photo Archive | ||