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Lot Essay
"Asked whether his works serve as a metaphor for the relation between the individual and the crowd, Gonzalez-Torres responds: ‘Perhaps between public and private, between personal and social, between fear of loss and the joy of loving, of growing, changing, of always becoming more, of losing oneself slowly and then being replenished all over again from scratch." (F. Gonzalez-Torres, quoted in Rollins, Tim, Susan Cahan, and Jan Avgikos. Felix Gonzalez- Torres. New York: Art Resources Transfer, Inc., 1993, p. 23).
A crowd, or rather a fragmentary impression of one, is pieced together in Felix Gonzalez-Torres’s 1988 photographic jigsaw puzzle, “Untitled”. The motif of the crowd appears early and often in the artist’s oeuvre. Sourced from newspapers and presented on puzzles, common-place objects like jars and tableware, paintings, and rub-on transfers installed directly onto a wall, these crowds serve as a foundational and persistent reminder of Gonzalez-Torres’ career-long interest in the arbitrary division of the individual and the collective, the public and private, the personal and the political.
In 1987, Gonzalez-Torres began producing a seminal series of jigsaw puzzles, of which the present work is a part. Though varied in source material–ranging from personal snapshots taken by the artist to images from mass media–the puzzles consistently examine the relationship between individual and collective, part and whole. The works evoke the idea of fragmentation: the imagery is transformed by its severance from the original media source and is seemingly tenuously held together by the puzzle pieces’ interlocking parts, the cardboard backing, and the plastic sleeve that envelops them. The puzzles constantly threaten to dissolve, recalling the fragility of the image and of memory.
Without the anchor of context, the puzzles become counterintuitively interactive. While the typical physical interaction with a puzzle is prohibited here by its encasement in the plastic bag, the puzzle becomes a conceptual and poetic vehicle for viewer participation. In the artist’s words, “I need the viewer… I need the public to complete the work. I ask the public to help me, to take responsibility, to become part of my work, to join in.” (Ibid.). Confronted with a decontextualized image, the viewer imbues the work with their own references.
In “Untitled”, blurred figures turn their heads toward an unknown focal point. By decentering and anonymizing the crowd in the source image, the viewer can perhaps identify more closely with the subject. The crowd, faceless and indistinct, becomes a channel through which viewers can project. Even the specific structuring of the title serves as an artistic intervention—or non-intervention—encouraging the viewer to create their own, ever-unfolding meaning. In this way, the indeterminacy of the art object paradoxically ensures its ongoing relevance and permanence.
This notion of mutability is not limited to Gonzalez-Torres’ puzzle works. The artist’s conceptual investment in publicness extends itself to his celebrated paper stacks and candy works, where the potential for viewer intervention continually imbues the work with new life. By creating a body of work that thrives upon endless change and revival, Gonzalez-Torres leaves an indelible mark on the history of conceptual art.
A crowd, or rather a fragmentary impression of one, is pieced together in Felix Gonzalez-Torres’s 1988 photographic jigsaw puzzle, “Untitled”. The motif of the crowd appears early and often in the artist’s oeuvre. Sourced from newspapers and presented on puzzles, common-place objects like jars and tableware, paintings, and rub-on transfers installed directly onto a wall, these crowds serve as a foundational and persistent reminder of Gonzalez-Torres’ career-long interest in the arbitrary division of the individual and the collective, the public and private, the personal and the political.
In 1987, Gonzalez-Torres began producing a seminal series of jigsaw puzzles, of which the present work is a part. Though varied in source material–ranging from personal snapshots taken by the artist to images from mass media–the puzzles consistently examine the relationship between individual and collective, part and whole. The works evoke the idea of fragmentation: the imagery is transformed by its severance from the original media source and is seemingly tenuously held together by the puzzle pieces’ interlocking parts, the cardboard backing, and the plastic sleeve that envelops them. The puzzles constantly threaten to dissolve, recalling the fragility of the image and of memory.
Without the anchor of context, the puzzles become counterintuitively interactive. While the typical physical interaction with a puzzle is prohibited here by its encasement in the plastic bag, the puzzle becomes a conceptual and poetic vehicle for viewer participation. In the artist’s words, “I need the viewer… I need the public to complete the work. I ask the public to help me, to take responsibility, to become part of my work, to join in.” (Ibid.). Confronted with a decontextualized image, the viewer imbues the work with their own references.
In “Untitled”, blurred figures turn their heads toward an unknown focal point. By decentering and anonymizing the crowd in the source image, the viewer can perhaps identify more closely with the subject. The crowd, faceless and indistinct, becomes a channel through which viewers can project. Even the specific structuring of the title serves as an artistic intervention—or non-intervention—encouraging the viewer to create their own, ever-unfolding meaning. In this way, the indeterminacy of the art object paradoxically ensures its ongoing relevance and permanence.
This notion of mutability is not limited to Gonzalez-Torres’ puzzle works. The artist’s conceptual investment in publicness extends itself to his celebrated paper stacks and candy works, where the potential for viewer intervention continually imbues the work with new life. By creating a body of work that thrives upon endless change and revival, Gonzalez-Torres leaves an indelible mark on the history of conceptual art.