🥫Pop Art and Mass Culture Unit 7 – Oldenburg: Soft Sculptures & Everyday Items

Who Was Claes Oldenburg?

• Claes Oldenburg (1929-2022) was a Swedish-born American sculptor, best known for his large-scale public installations and soft sculptures
• Studied at Yale University and the Art Institute of Chicago in the late 1940s and early 1950s
• Moved to New York City in 1956, where he became a key figure in the Pop Art movement
• Collaborated with his wife, Coosje van Bruggen, on numerous large-scale projects from 1976 until her death in 2009
• Oldenburg's work often featured oversized, soft replicas of everyday objects, challenging traditional notions of sculpture and art
• Received numerous awards and honors, including the National Medal of Arts (2000) and the Wolf Prize in Arts (1989)

The Rise of Pop Art

• Pop Art emerged in the mid-1950s in Britain and the United States as a reaction against the seriousness and elitism of Abstract Expressionism
• Influenced by popular culture, mass media, and consumerism, Pop Art sought to blur the lines between "high art" and "low art"
• Key figures in the Pop Art movement included Andy Warhol, Roy Lichtenstein, Tom Wesselmann, and Claes Oldenburg
• Pop Art often incorporated imagery from advertisements, comic books, and consumer products, celebrating and critiquing the rapidly growing consumer culture
• The movement gained international recognition in the 1960s, with major exhibitions such as "The New Realists" (1962) and the Venice Biennale (1964)
• Pop Art's influence extended beyond the visual arts, impacting fashion, music, and popular culture

Oldenburg's Soft Sculptures: Concept and Execution

• Oldenburg began creating soft sculptures in the early 1960s, using materials such as canvas, vinyl, and foam rubber
• These sculptures were often oversized, drooping, and distorted versions of everyday objects (hamburgers, telephones, toilets)
• By rendering these objects in soft, pliable materials, Oldenburg subverted their original functions and challenged traditional notions of sculpture
• The soft sculptures were often displayed in unconventional ways, such as being propped up against walls or draped over pedestals
  • For example, "Giant Soft Fan" (1966-67) was displayed hanging from the ceiling, its blades drooping and folding under their own weight
• Oldenburg's soft sculptures were a commentary on the increasing prevalence of mass-produced, disposable goods in American society
• The artist's process involved sketching ideas, creating small-scale models, and collaborating with seamstresses and fabricators to realize the final works

Everyday Objects as Art

• Oldenburg's focus on everyday objects as subjects for his art was a key aspect of his contribution to the Pop Art movement
• By elevating mundane items to the status of art, he challenged traditional hierarchies and definitions of what constituted "fine art"
• Oldenburg's sculptures often played with scale, enlarging small objects to monumental proportions or shrinking large objects to a more intimate size
  • "Clothespin" (1976), a 45-foot-tall steel sculpture in Philadelphia, transforms a common household item into a towering public monument
• The artist's choice of subjects often had humorous or ironic undertones, as seen in works like "Soft Toilet" (1966) and "Lipstick (Ascending) on Caterpillar Tracks" (1969-74)
• Oldenburg's exploration of everyday objects extended to his happenings and performances in the early 1960s, such as "The Store" (1961), where he sold plaster replicas of consumer goods in a rented storefront

Materials and Techniques

• Oldenburg's soft sculptures were created using a variety of materials, including canvas, vinyl, foam rubber, and kapok stuffing
• The artist often worked with industrial sewing machines and collaborated with professional seamstresses to construct the large-scale works
• Oldenburg experimented with different fabrics and textures to achieve the desired level of softness, draping, and translucency in each sculpture
• In addition to soft sculptures, Oldenburg also created large-scale public installations using more durable materials such as steel, aluminum, and fiberglass
  • These works, like "Spoonbridge and Cherry" (1985-1988) in Minneapolis, combined the artist's interest in everyday objects with the permanence and monumentality of public art
• Oldenburg's sketches and drawings played a crucial role in his creative process, serving as a means of exploring ideas and refining compositions before realizing the final sculptures

Key Works and Exhibitions

• "The Store" (1961): A seminal exhibition in which Oldenburg rented a storefront on Manhattan's Lower East Side and filled it with plaster replicas of consumer goods
• "Soft Toilet" (1966): A vinyl and kapok sculpture that subverts the functionality and solidity of a common bathroom fixture
• "Lipstick (Ascending) on Caterpillar Tracks" (1969-74): A large-scale outdoor sculpture commissioned by Yale University, featuring a giant lipstick tube atop a military tank base
• "Clothespin" (1976): A 45-foot-tall steel sculpture in Philadelphia, which transforms a mundane household item into a monumental public artwork
• "Spoonbridge and Cherry" (1985-1988): A large-scale public sculpture in Minneapolis, featuring a giant spoon with a cherry balanced on its tip, created in collaboration with Coosje van Bruggen
• "Shuttlecocks" (1994): A series of four large-scale sculptures installed on the lawn of the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art in Kansas City, Missouri, each depicting a badminton shuttlecock

Impact on Contemporary Art

• Oldenburg's soft sculptures and everyday object-inspired works had a significant impact on the development of Pop Art and contemporary art more broadly
• His use of unconventional materials and focus on mundane subjects influenced a generation of artists, including Jeff Koons, Damien Hirst, and Takashi Murakami
• Oldenburg's collaborations with Coosje van Bruggen helped to redefine the role of public art, emphasizing site-specificity, community engagement, and accessibility
• The artist's playful, irreverent approach to art-making challenged traditional notions of "high art" and paved the way for the emergence of postmodernism in the 1970s and 1980s
• Oldenburg's legacy can be seen in the work of contemporary artists who engage with consumerism, popular culture, and the blurring of boundaries between art and everyday life

Critical Reception and Debates

• Oldenburg's work initially received mixed reviews from critics, with some dismissing his soft sculptures as mere novelties or gimmicks
• However, as the Pop Art movement gained momentum in the 1960s, Oldenburg's work began to be recognized as a significant contribution to the dialogue surrounding art and popular culture
• Some critics argued that Oldenburg's focus on everyday objects and consumer goods was a superficial celebration of American consumerism, while others saw it as a subversive critique of the same
• Oldenburg's public sculptures, created in collaboration with Coosje van Bruggen, sometimes sparked debates about the role of public art and its relationship to the surrounding community
  • The installation of "Shuttlecocks" (1994) at the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, for example, initially faced resistance from some local residents who felt the sculptures were inappropriate for the museum's neoclassical facade
• Despite these debates, Oldenburg's work has been widely celebrated and recognized as a key contribution to the development of 20th-century art, with major retrospectives at institutions such as the Museum of Modern Art (1969) and the Guggenheim Museum (1995)