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PEOPLE & ARTS Thursday 9 January 2020
Acclaimed Conceptual artist John Baldessari dies at 88

By JOHN ROGERS He was also painting and
Associated Press showing his work, although
LOS ANGELES (AP) — John by the late 1960s he’d be-
Baldessari, who pioneered gun to grow bored with
a new genre of art in the what he and others were
1970s and in the process producing.
helped elevate Los Ange- Before torching his paint-
les’ status in the art world ings in 1970, he created a
from that of back-water magazine cover that de-
berg to a center of the picted a copy of a painting
Conceptual movement, with the words, “This is not
has died at age 88. to be looked at” painted
Baldessari died Thursday at underneath the work as a
his home in Los Angeles, the caption.
artist’s representatives at After incinerating his own
New York’s Marian Good- work, he began teaching
man Gallery confirmed at CalArts, where his stu-
Monday. dents included Salle, Mike
“It is with immense sadness Kelley, Barbara Bloom and
that I write to let you know other future prominent art-
of the death of the intel- ists.
ligent, loving and incom- Later he taught for several
parable John Baldessari,” years at UCLA.
Goodman said in a state- Over the years, he collect-
ment. “The loss to his family, ed numerous honors, in-
his fellow artists, his studio cluding the National Med-
staff, friends and devoted al of Arts from President
former students is beyond In this Thursday, Sept. 17, 2015, file photo, artist John Baldessari poses at The Broad museum's Barack Obama.
measure.” opening and inaugural dinner in Los Angeles. His works are in the collec-
A giant in the world of art Associated Press tions of New York’s Museum
both literally and figura- of Modern Art, the Art Insti-
tively — he stood 6-feet-7- ment he believed had Matisse,” which combined that visual glamour, which tute of Chicago, New York’s
inches tall — the bearded, grown old and stale, inkjet print on canvas with was very much apart from Whitney Museum, the San
shaggy-haired Baldessari Baldessari set out to cre- acrylic and oil paint to dis- other Conceptual artists Francisco Museum of Mod-
produced thousands of ate something new, cre- play a pair of walking legs who were much more re- ern Art and in Los Angeles’
works, many of which have ating multimedia works and the words, “Just Ma- strained,” Salle added. The Broad, the Museum of
been exhibited all over the that among other things tisse.” “That was a winning combi- Contemporary Art and the
world and are in the col- merged photographs with Those works and others of- nation that made his work County Museum of Art.
lections of major museums painting, sometimes in- ten struck viewers as both accessible and pleasurable “He’s someone who’s had
from Los Angeles to New cluded pieces of recogniz- brilliantly constructed and and complex and dense all over 377 solo exhibitions,
York. able objects or body parts at the same time whimsi- at the same time.” been part of more than
He also influenced dozens but in unimaginable ways cal, although Baldessari John Anthony Baldessari 1,500 group exhibitions,
of other artists, both with and often contained per- insisted he was never try- was born on June 17, 1931, who has produced over
his work and as a teacher fectly formed block letters ing to be funny. Instead in National City, California, 4,000 works of art,” former
at the prestigious California placed as captions on the he compared himself to a a small town on both the MOCA director Philippe
Institute of the Arts and the paintings. mystery writer, providing edge of San Diego and the Vergne said when the mu-
University of California, Los It was a style that prompted clues to the reader, or in Mexican city of Tijuana. His seum honored him in 2015.
Angeles. Los Angeles Times arts critic this case the viewer, and father, a salvage dealer, As the accolades accumu-
“His legendary class in Post- Christopher Knight to de- letting them figure it out. was from Austria and his lated over the years, the
Studio Art bestowed on clare Baldessari “arguably ”I go back and forth be- mother from Denmark. soft-spoken artist remained
those of us with enough America’s most influential tween wanting to be abun- Showing artistic talent from humble, even mocking his
brains to notice a feeling of Conceptual artist.” dantly simple and mad- an early age, he was often work during a 2018 appear-
unbelievable luck of being Over the course of his ca- deningly complex,” he chosen by teachers to cre- ance on “The Simpsons,” in
in exactly the right place reer, which continued into told Salle during that 2013 ate murals or other art proj- which he discusses art with
at the right time for the his 80s, Baldessari worked in interview. “I always com- ects. After high school, he Marge.
new freedoms in art,” fel- such forms as prints, sculp- pare what I do to the work decided to study art at San “I still have that vestigial
low artist David Salle wrote ture, text-based art, paint- of a mystery writer— like, Diego State University de- idea that all these other
in the 2013 introduction to ings and photographs, of- you don’t want to know spite his father’s concerns people are artists. I’m an
a lengthy interview he con- ten mixing two or more of the end of the book right that it could be something artist wannabe,” he told
ducted with Baldessari, his them together. away.” he’d struggle at to earn a Salle in 2013.
CalArts professor in the ear- Some of his most well Although he may not have living. When Salle told him he’d
ly 1970s. known works included deliberately intended his After earning a master’s created a movement
Student met teacher at a “God Nose,” which de- work to be humorous, Salle degree, he went on to that altered art history, he
time not long after Baldes- picted a nose in the sky told The Associated Press teach art at his alma ma- laughed.
sari, having grown frustrat- with those two words under on Monday, humor, irony ter, at local public schools “I thought I was going to
ed with his own abstract it; “The Intersection Series: and humanity were so im- and, for one summer, at a teach high school, maybe
expressionist paintings, Person and Dog/High Rise bued in Baldessari’s per- camp for teenage juvenile have a family, and do art
loaded them into 10 boxes, Building,” a mixture of pho- sonality that they became delinquents. He would joke on the weekends,” he re-
took them to a San Diego tography and acrylic that “almost like the delivery sys- in later years that it was plied.
funeral home and burned included a dog, a building, tem of his work.” likely his imposing size as Survivors include Baldessa-
them. a car and other images; “And then later on, at much as his artistic skills that ri’s daughter, Annamarie,
Bored with an art move- and “Double Bill :... And some point he added to earned him that latter job. and son, Tony.q