#felix-gonzales torres

[pagansphinx]

Art Movements

Art movements, "schools", artist groups, and societies do not function in the same way as they once did. There were art movements in the earlier years of contemporary art but those too have gone the way of art history. In the late 20th to 21st centuries there are no art movements to speak of, due to globalization and the sheer volume and diversity of the art world. Even Conceptual Art, which endures to this day, is more of a term or category than a movement.

Some will argue that there are lots of contemporary art movements – Minimilism, Monochrome, and Participatory Art, to name a few. True, though I see these as a club with so many members that connection and cohesiveness are impossible to achieve. That isn't to say that's bad. Again, it's due to how large, diverse, and world-wide these movements are. Everyone doesn't know everyone as they did in Impressionism or Surrealism.

An example of Monochrome Art

Robert Ryman (American, 1930-2019 • Ledger • 1982 • Enamelac paint on fibreglass, aluminium and wood • Tate Modern

l'm nostalgic about the art created before the 1950s. I like some of work done in the earlier movements of contemporary art — pop art is fun. The Fluxus Movement produced some cool stuff –à la Yoko Ono. Word Art is not my favorite, though it is unlike me to dismiss it as bad art because I've not seen much of it.

An example of Word Art

Barbara Kruger (American, b. 1945) • Untitled (Your body is a battleground) • 1989 • photographic silkscreen on vinyl

An example of Participatory Art

I "participated" in this artwork – Untitled (Portrait of Ross in L.A.). It was colorful, interesting, and fun but also very sad. I believe it was at The Whitney in New York. It's a pile of candy in confetti colored wrappings (In other installations the colors vary). It can exist in more than one location at the same time, starting with a specific weight 175 pounds (79 kg). Participants are encouraged to take one candy and the quantity diminishes. The artist, Félix González-Torres was a gay man whose partner, Ross Laycock, died of complications of HIV/AIDS in 1991. One art critic's interpretation of the art work was "the diminishment recalls how he (the artist's partner) wasted away before dying." Félix González-Torres himself died in 1996 of HIV.

Félix González-Torres (Cuban-American, 1957-1996) • Untitled (Portrait of Ross in L.A.) • 1991

What is your favorite contemporary art movement or individual artist? Please comment. You don't have to be an expert, you just have to know what you like. I'd love to hear from you!

#art #art history #art movements #contemporary art #21st century art #word art #conceptual art #monochrome art #felix-gonzales torres #barbara kruger #robert ryman #participatory art #contemporary art movements #20th century art movements #hiv/aids #queer artist #woman artist #pagan sphinx art blog #writings about art

[sunflowermp4]

saw "untitled (portrait of ross in l.a.)" by felix gonzalez-torres in person today and cried and smiled and took a piece and cried again. 🏳️‍🌈

#felix gonzales-torres #.txt

[kerimcangoren]

In a much-published interview, Tim Rollins asked Gonzalez-Torres what he would like from his students. He replied that he would like them to be generous. It was a revealing answer from an artist who placed such a high priority on generosity in his own work. The celebrated paper stacks and the arrangements of candy described by the artist as having an ideal height or weight and from which the visitor was invited to take one (or more) elements to be replaced as necessary from an endless supply, function as symbolic generosity while alluding to another, impossible generosity: the hope of endless renewal, a secular realization of divine grace. This is the language of prayers and a gesture approaching transubstantiation, but like the wily priest, Gonzalez-Torres' gifts create obligations. The 'gift' work seems to fulfill an unkept promise of the 1960s, the decommodification of art, but they are not precisely that. Gonzalez-Torres proposes a transaction as old as the ritual of gift-giving: to accept an element of his work is to be implicated in its realization, and in its future.

Lewis Baltz / Texts, 2012 / p. 133-134

#quote #quotes #Texts #Lewis Baltz #Felix Gonzales-Torres #artistic implication #gift #giving #generosity #paper stacks #candy

[gregdotorg]

"Untitled" (USA Today), 1990, by Felix Gonzalez-Torres

#felix gonzales torres #the jewish museum #mmk frankfurt #red white and blue #usa today was a newspaper you had to step over when you stayed at a chain hotel

[mondfahrt]

sotheby's let robert pattinson curate their contemporary auction????

he has a very interesting way of speaking about art and there are some great insight there. some amazing art works, too, of course!

#unfortunately i HATE auction houses with a passion. they're on the same level as mega dealers... #but hhhhhhhhhhhh some of these art works here..... god i wish i could stare at those daily (and i probably won't bc these are getting sold) #(but also still funny how much the felix gonzales torres piece is being listed for. ....) #ANYWAY #art history #contemporary art #robert pattinson #sothebys #Youtube

[sorcadh]

Absent bodies

Felix Gonzalez-Torres, “Untitled,” 1991

"much of Gonzales-Torres' art questions what we mean when we describe things as 'private' or as 'public'. Are we referring to private lives, for example, or private thoughts? To private property or private spaces? Are we responding to how these meanings conflict, intersect, and draw significance from their apparent opposite, what is 'public' - public personas, public opinions, public art, public space?"

The bed was displayed on billboards in 24 different locations across New York.

"Absence shadows Gonzales-Torres' work in every way. Rumpled bedsheets and dented pillows are presented both as evidence of and as a sign for two absent human bodies. Ghostly contours are all that is left of beings who are no longer there. Pasted to and inseparable from both gallery wall and billboard surface, the image hugs its supports rather than taking up space".

"Surrounded by there predominantly vertical structures of New York City, Gonzalez-Torres' bed is resolutely recumbent. An empty bed invites us all to 'climb in', no matter who we are - gay, straight, male or female, black or white. Thus, the artist establishes a common ground. At the same time, one of the artists merits of art like this is that it reminds us that no one work of art, no single image, means the same thing to everyone. Unmade beds with tousled sheets may provoke sexual fantasies for some, and evoke painful memories for others. Nearly all of us were born in beds, and many of us know people who have died in them. Between these moments of life and death, beds are a place where we can rest. And in this city with its huge homeless population, the image of a bed reminds us of something lost".

#Felix gonzales-Torres #absent bodies #bed

[surfedoutbrainwaves]

yes i spent an hour redesigning my screensavers no i don’t regret it

#txt #mine #they’re so cute!!! pics from prom bc i like the way polaroid and photo strips look :) #vintage pin images found on pinterest and artwork is one of my faves by felix gonzales torres

[highly-important]

Little Art things I'm obsessed with pt 1

Portraits of absent figures:

David Hockney - A Bigger Splash, 1967

Hockney originally visited California in 1963 and was won over by the sunlight and laid-back lifestyle, especially the luxury and ubiquity of the swimming pool. He described it as his "promised land" The splash is about freezing a moment in time, but it is also empty of human presence but implying a human. The male figure is present in some of David's other works from this time period, especially his muse and then-partner Peter Schlesinger. These paintings are about a hedonistic gay lifestyle, and the swimmers, the divers, are often the subject of voyeurism and desire. But in this painting, we just missed the diver, which makes the object of desire more private and personal. Who was the painter looking at, lusting after, etc. I like the contrast of the incredibly sharp and graphic suburban neighborhood, and the chaotic, organic splash. So again, if the divers represent this homosexual desire, we have this contrast of an orderly heterosexual world, and the queerness that joyfully disrupts it.

And then of course, with the absent figure, there is this massive sense of loss and loneliness. And so much of loneliness is about concealment, hiding in shame. This is a private space, but its also an exposed space, enhancing the loneliness. The figure is isolated, alone, invisible. Its a sadness that contrasts with the setting, the activity, and saturated lighting.

Felix Gonzalez-Torres - Untitled (billboard of an empty bed), 1991

These billboards were exhibited in the streets of Manhattan during the AIDS crisis. This piece was created the same year Felix Gonzalez-Torres's boyfriend Ross died. This portrait is a celebration of love and a memorization of loss and the emotions between intimacy and publicity. In the artist's own words:

“What I’m trying to say is that we cannot give the powers that be what they want, what they are expecting from us. Some homophobic senator is going to have a very hard time trying to explain to his constituency that my work is homoerotic or pornographic, but if I were to do a performance with HIV blood — that’s what he wants, that’s what the rags expect because they can sensationalize that, and that’s what’s disappointing. Some of the work I make is more effective because it’s more dangerous. We both make work that looks like something else but it’s not that. We’re infiltrating that look.“

The work intentionally uses the matching, identical depressions to imply a same-sex couple. The image itself is extremely intimate, but its being displayed in public spaces.

Felix Gonzales-Torres became known for his absent bodies.

And then, a little different, this painting by Jacques Guillaume Lucien Amans (1837) commissioned by Frederick and and Coralie Frey, depicts the three Frey children, with the faint shadow of a figure. There was a legend that there was a fourth figure in this painting. In 2005 a private collector, Jeremy K Simien, purchased the painting and it underwent conservation.

The painting revealed Bélizaire, a fifteen year-old enslaved domestic owned by the children's father. The picture captures the complex relationship between the boy and the children, the family that was keeping him captive. For one thing, the way he is set back from the others. There is this sort of intimacy between them along side the psychological trauma of forced bondage.

Here is a great Tiktok about the painting, to quote "What I'm struck by is what a sensitive portrait this is of this young man who was living in an inhumane society where he, despite being a human being, was bought and sold."

A few years after this painting was created, the three Frey children died, and Bélizaire was the only one who survived into adulthood.

The painting stayed in the Frey family. At some point, likely in the late 19th or 20th century, Bélizaire was intentionally painted over. In 1972, the great-granddaughter of Coralie Frey donated the painting to a Louisiana museum, informing them that a figure was painted over. During the course of the painting's life at the museum, no effort was put into restoring the figure.

Jeremy Simien's, who bought and restored this painting, said on his instagram "Bélizaire, they know your name now. Tell the ancestors to let me sleep for a minute."

And shout out to the picture that make me want to write this, Hyde Park Flowers, London by Tumblr user @kimironside I won't re-post it so check out the link.

#art #art history #felix gonzalez torres #belizaire #david hockney #Jacques Guillaume Lucien Amans #Jacques Amans #Jeremy K Simien #tw slavery #tw aids

[horsesinmydreams]

felix gonzales torres at david zwirner nyc

#also bf reveal<3 #i love him very much

[trashratsaws]

Something I've been finding quite irritating about the lack of media and culture literacy we're seeing - because of course the least educated people speak the loudest I fear - is that it's almost forced me to become an advocate for art I don't particularly enjoy. I don't enjoy modern or contemporary art. I don't like it, I think it's overblown, and I think a lot of modern/contemporary movements are juvenile, underdeveloped, and crude. I will also defend modern and contemporary art until I die from white tiktok women who claim that they could make better art from the comfort of their upper middle class couches because apparently despite pretending to be cultured by going to the museums where modern art is housed and proclaiming to their thousands of followers that they have done so - which was a choice, by the way, they could have really gone to any museum that served their one-note tastes all the better - they simply cannot be bothered to do any sort of research or reading on what the modern/contemporary art actually means, how it was created, the backgrounds of the artists who create it, etc., or even to read the plaque next to the piece while they stand next to it making their videos about how lifeless and uninteresting they find it.

There is a huge difference between disliking something because you understand it vs. because you don't. Please for the love of god, if you're going to loudly dislike something, please be the person who dislikes it because you understand it, and spare me the trouble of trying to shout just as loudly that, well, yes, Jackson Pollock was the worst, but please leave his genre alone because you sound like quite the toad when you speak.

Anyway I lied before, so here are some avant-garde movements/artists/pieces I really like/find very interesting to do some more research on for yourself.

the Die Brücke (The Bridge, German expressionist group)

Mexican Muralism (Mexican artistic movement post-revolution of 1910)

Brasilia (failed Brazilian capital city with some crazy architecture. Also utopianism in general)

Neo-Dadaism/Post-modernism (generally cheekier movement than the abstract expressionists who took their work and mission far too seriously)

Marjorie Strider (woman pop artist who critiqued a lot of sexism in the art world with her work. See also The Girlies Exhibition)

Liberation of Aunt Jemima and Betye Saar

One and Three Chairs and Conceptual Art (this is the one people like to complain the most about)

Yayoi Kusama (particularly Narcissus Garden. Very good stuff)

Felix Gonzales-Torres (if you don't already know him. Tell me you can look at Perfect Lovers without crying)

Rhythm 0 (imo the single most impactful, raw, gut-wrenching work Marina Abramovic ever produced. Performance art. Devastating)

Shigeko Kubota (Vagina Painting. almost a direct fuck-you to Pollock's macho vibe)

Earth Art (exactly what it sounds like - work that relies on nature. The Lightning Field is on my bucket list)

#my credentials are fuck you mind your buisness #jk i'm a senior at art school and art history is my special interest #i also wrote a research paper about queer cuban modern art so if that's interesting to u go check it #also if you go out there and learn PLEASE SEND ME ASKS WITH YOUR THOUGHTS #I WANT TO TALK TO PEOPLE WHO AREN'T GENUINELY WRETCHED ABOUT ART HISTORY #art history #rat rambles

[woundgallery]

Felix Gonzales Torres, Untitled , (placebo) 1991 - candies, individually wrapped in silver cellophane, endless supply, ideal weight 500-600 kg, dimension variable

#felix gonzalez-torres #fields #food art #dreamscapes #art #conceptual art #minimalism #installation #communion #elegy #aids #political art #post suicide attempt purgatory dreamscape #grief

[mentaltimetraveller]

Felix Gonzales-Torres, Untitled (Lover Boys), 1991

#félix gonzález-torres #felix gonzález-torres #felix gonzalez torres

[yvepaints]

Favorite piece of contemporary art? Or what art piece do you have hanging in your place? (I’ll show you mine if you show me yours) 😵‍💫

My favorite pieces of contemporary art are “Feel It Motherfuckers” by John Boskovich, “Untitled (Portrait of Ross in L. A.)” by Felix Gonzales-Torres, and “Unfinish Painting” by Keith Haring!

In my space I have prints of “Madonnina” by Roberto Ferruzzi, “Houses in Auvers” by Vincent Van Gogh, and another piece that I’ve yet to identify. ❤️

#send asks #ask me anything #asks open #ask #art #artists on tumblr #artblr #visual art

[kerimcangoren]

Untitled (Perfect Lovers), 1991

Felix Gonzales-Torres

#Felix Gonzales-Torres #Untitled (Perfect Lovers) #1991 #installation #conceptual art #aids #grief #death #life #love #vanitas

[gregdotorg]

an auction house in berlin is selling a free poster from a felix gonzalez torres stack as a print by christopher wool, from a christopher wool stack. happy 'why are people paying money for free felix posters?' to all who celebrate.

#felix gonzales-torres #christopher wool #collab #stack #endless supply of free posters #the felix work of an endless stack of free posters of wool's painting is in the hoffmann collection in berlin

[xndre]

I wanted to make a holiday message using monochrome colors. I just could not ignore how the standard christmas colors are the exact colors of "forbidden colors" by Felix Gonzales Torres.