"Extra-Ordinary: The Everyday Object in American Art" is one of the latest exhibitions hosted by the Austin Museum of Art, starting on the 25th of August 2007. It is also one of the most original presented here, as it is an unique presentation of ordinary everyday objects in a new light. The curators have selected around 30 sculptures, paintings, prints, photographs from the rich collection of the Whitney Museum of American Art, artworks which literally play with the usual reality. Traditional and useful objects, otherwise disregarded, are transformed into art.
The works chosen for the show range over a period of 40 years, and as a whoile they represent an impressive record of popular American culture, as it reunites usual household items, foods, beverages, personal objects, transfixed by art. The artists featured in the exhibition range from Alexander Calder, Vija Celmins and Tony Feher to Robert Gober, Marisol, Claes Oldenburg, James Rosenquist, Jessica Stockholder, Andy Warhol.
This show features those ingenious, tremendous useful yet easy to ignore objects we use in everyday life an activities, yet tampered with in an artistic manner to attract the user's attention and imagination. What is so special about a Dell laptop, a dog bowl, a sandwich or a water cooler ? Nothing much, yet the artists, using various mediums, managed to transpose these into a new light and world.
Photo : amoa.org
2007-09-17
