Jasper Johns: Watch Out Crossing the Street
Robert Rauschenberg is one of a small pantheon of modern artists whom I revere. I’d probably revere more of them if I could remember them all, but never mind.
I remember the first retrospective show I saw, at MOMA, including the fabulous “Bed” and “Obelisk”, among many others I knew largely from books. A later show at the Guggenheim was somehow less compelling, and consisted largely, if not exclusively, of more recent work (so I guess not so much a retrospective).
Anyway, I guess that signed screen print of the Talking Heads “Speaking in Tongues” limited edition cover art I’ve got up on the wall just got a little more valuable. After David Byrne departs this mortal coil, it ought to be an eBay killer, but I only wish him well, really.
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4 comments:
I was wondering what it would take to jolt this site back into action. Thank goodness it was only the death of an iconic American artist, and not a crisis in Australian politics.
Rooting around in the attic, as is her habit, LCA came across a Talking Heads tee shirt and was wearing it yesterday. She liked it because it seemed somewhat retro, as indeed it is, but she was not particularly familiar with the band's work. I have it all on vinyl, which means it is less often heard in our house, but she enjoys mining the vinyl, and said she'd give a listen. It is funny to think that a band like that, which I associate with a specific time is, for her, lumped into more or less the same time as Simon & Garfunkel, The Beatles, and ABBA. It isn't nostalgia for her-- it's just history.
Seeing Lil inthe t-shirt made me laugh... That was a great show at Forest Hills,never mind the $15 Heinekins-- You and us and Tom and, I think Fred?, a great show.
Did Raushenberg do that sculpture in, I think, Milwaukee, of the giant spoon with the cherry on it? And did hdo the giant vinyl hamburger?? Now THAT was an artist.
But I may have Raushenberg confused with another guy. Was Rauschenberg the sort of giant comic strip artist? Either way, not up to the standard of Hopper or Wyeth but still...imaginative!
Rauschenberg was, essentially, a collagist, although he extended that form across a variety of more standard genres and media. The Milwaukee sculpture wasn't his, but it is pretty good. Lichtenstein is the "comicbook" artist you're thinking of, although his work extends well beyond those.
I'll never forget driving the Blue Whale through Forest Hills on a flat tire, thinking it was the state of the roads that made it so hard to steer, and only to discover later that the car didn't have a tire iron in the trunk.
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