CLAES OLDENBURG (1929-2022)

CLAES OLDENBURG An American Pop art artist, Claes Oldenburg is well known for his innovative renditions of everyday, and seemingly insignificant, objects. From saggy hamburgers to colossal stamps and giant ice cream cones, Oldenburg fascination with shifting scales, shapes, and textures of mundane objects is as much Pop art as it is Surreal. According to the artist, “I am for an art that grows up not knowing it is art at all. I am for an artist who vanishes.”

Over the course of his career, Oldenburg has worked in a variety of media, including printmaking, drawing, performance, and writing, and has remained at the forefront of the Conceptual and Pop art movements. No matter the medium, the artist’s objects are expressive entities that upend our notions of the viewer and viewed, consumer and consumed, and highlight the absurdity of American culture.

Between 1969 and 1970, the Museum of Modern Art, New York, London’s Tate Gallery, and the Guggenheim hosted solo exhibitions of the artist’s work. Since then, the artist has been honored with several solo exhibitions and retrospectives in museums and galleries around the world.

ARTWORK

CLAES OLDENBURG
Two Ray Guns
painted plaster and colored acrylic
25 x 21 x 2 in.
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