Whitney Museum of American Art
June 28, 2007 - October 14, 2007
Employing such materials as rubber, carpet, painted aluminum, Styrofoam, and paint, Rudolf Stingel's work questions and disrupts the viewer's understanding and experience of an art object. Although Stingel's work does not always involve paint on canvas, it continually reflects upon some of the fundamental questions concerning painting today, including authenticity, hierarchy, meaning, and context. He brings together the ordinary and the religious to show the viewer that they are the ones creating the meaning and importance of certain objects and rituals. Stingel is a fascinating figure in terms of his investigationof painting and his use of unconventional materials. He also uses materials to engage with notions of decoration. His approach expands upon and challenges traditional ideas of painting and sculpture.
In 2005, Stingel disguised his art dealer and gallery owner as a somewhat familiar celebrity by using the methods of a shrine and placing her portrait in the center of an empty well lit gallery. With such focus and celebration viewers assumed she was someone important. In which Stingel creates an opportunity to ask several questions. How do we decide who or what is worthy of such immaculate representation? How should this space be used and what belongs here? In a more sculptural piece by Stingel, a Buddha becomes an artist or an artist becomes a Buddha with multiple hands and tools for crafting. To an artist these processes are spiritual rituals, ones capable of providing enlightenment for both the maker and the viewer. In another work, what could be seen as an instructional poster for cooking (yet another process to be revered) is hung and viewed as fine art. In revealing the methods and representations we use in order to signify that something or someone is more important or more sacred, Stingel is able to create an icon out of just about anything. The banal becomes infused with meaning, and he is not the only one creating it, we the viewers are just as much a part of this process, the process of communicating through art.
In this show at the Whitney viewers are invited to participate even more by drawing on the foiled walls of one room and your portrait being reflected along with raised gold brocade patterns in a shimmering mirrored floor of another. The shiny beautiful environments draw, even those who would rather scoff, in long enough to think about the art. By commanding us to work, to do our job as the viewer, we become engaged and his art succeeds on all levels.
Stingel has just finished a show at the MCA (Chicago) ending in May and was also shown in the 2006 Whitney Biennial. Stingel was born in Merano Italy in 1956, and he continues to live and work in New York City.
