The spaces of everyday life: Claes Oldenburg, 1959--1969.
Item
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Title
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The spaces of everyday life: Claes Oldenburg, 1959--1969.
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Identifier
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AAI3115295
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identifier
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3115295
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Creator
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Tepfer, Ellen.
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Contributor
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Adviser: Romy Golan
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Date
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2004
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Language
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English
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Publisher
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City University of New York.
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Subject
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Art History
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Abstract
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This thesis proposes that a serious reconsideration of the early work of Claes Oldenburg necessitates a reconsideration of the division between space and surface in 1960s art, that is, between art concerned primarily with issues of spatial investigation and that concerned primarily with questions of image and representation. Although one of the key figures associated with Pop Art in art historical literature, Oldenburg did not focus on the slickness and superficiality of media and commercial imagery, nor did he employ the cool impersonality of mass media production techniques. Instead, he emphasized the tactile and experiential quality of his sculptures and installations and chose subjects of the most immediate familiarity, giving the viewer a sense of an embodied experience in real space rather than a purely visual experience.;The thesis uses the concept of "everyday life" rather than that of "low art" or "popular culture" often brought to bear on Pop Art. In the 1960s, everyday life began to take on new importance both as a theoretical construct and as a site of political activism. Using both semiotic and social models, I argue that Oldenburg's work extends the exploration of space beyond the concerns of sculpture and into its social context, so that the spaces of everyday life---the street, the store, the home, the city---become themselves the very subject of the work.;I further argue that in contrast to Oldenburg's later large-scale projects, his 1960s work addressed the spaces of the city not as fully determined and intact, but as an open proposition that can be engaged by active participants. Through techniques such as parody and defamiliarization, Oldenburg's work points not only to the power of disciplinary institutions and discourses, but also reveals how social interaction produces the potential for critique and change.
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Type
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dissertation
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Source
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PQT Legacy CUNY.xlsx
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degree
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Ph.D.
