Art & Art History
Öyvind Fahlström: The Complete Graphics and Multiples
Öyvind Fahlström: The Complete Graphics and Multiples was a comprehensive survey of Öyvind Fahlström’s graphic work, including twenty-seven prints as well as multiple editions in three-dimensional object and book format. Vibrantly colored, and densely packed with cartoon imagery and text, Fahlström’s prints bring to life dramas of global politics, as well as reveal historical truths about political, social, and economic issues. Fahlström described his strategy as “orchestrat[ing] data, so people will – at best – both understand and be outraged.” Through a free-form recombination and morphing of his source material, Fahlström revealed obscured social machinations. This exhibition was organized by Gallery 400 at the University of Illinois at Chicago and Bank One, Corporation and traveled to six venues throughout the country.
Born in São Paolo, Brazil in 1938 of a Norwegian father and Swedish mother, Öyvind Fahlström led a peripatetic life that included years in Sweden, Italy, France, and New York. During the summer of 1939 he traveled to Sweden to visit his grandmother and was stranded by the outbreak of World War II. He attended school there until his parents returned to Stockholm in 1948. Fahlström received his degree in art history and archeology from the University of Stockholm in 1952. After receiving a grant from the Swedish-American Foundation he moved to New York in 1961, where he became immediately involved with a group of artists, including Robert Rauschenberg, Jasper Johns, and Robert Morris. Fahlström died in Stockholm in 1976.
Öyvind Fahlström was a visual artist, concrete poet, journalist, playwright, critic, filmmaker, and activist. Inspired by an eclectic range of sources, including the Surrealists, pre-Columbian manuscripts, modern Mexican art, John Cage, jazz, and underground comic artists like Crumb, Fahlström utilized diverse media, producing works in film, performance, installation, sculpture, prints, and painting. Though often classified as Pop because of his use of popular imagery, the political narratives in Fahlström’s work align him more with the ambitions of the Conceptual artists. A multi-media artist, Fahlström made use of many forms of distribution, including exhibitions, books, poetry, magazines, film, opera, television, and radio. He worked in the fields of painting, graphics, sculpture, film, comics, happenings, and radio theater. He mixed all of these areas as well as creating forms of his own.
Fahlström’s main interest was in the political implications of contemporary art. Fahlström believed in art as a force for changing consciousness and the world. His works are at once political fantasies and the result of meticulous research. He scrupulously followed economic and socio-political developments around the world, responding to ever-shifting global situations. Central to his work is a synthesis of psychodrama, truth of history, game theory, maps, puzzles, performance, and installations. His interests in language, journalism, and game-playing provided a foundation for artworks which typically invite viewer participation and incorporate variable possibilities for resolution. The works’ visual and textual openness helps them to avoid a stern didacticism. They are poetic as well as critical.
Fahlström discussed his process in “Sausages and Tweezers – A Running Commentary” (1966):
“My basic interpretation of the concept of a game – and my artistic use of it – is not evolved from the strategy theories of von Neumann, Hermann Kahn, etc. I am more inclined to refer to Cage’s method of composition, and psychologists such as T. Leary and E. Berne. But above all, the idea of a game for me is a simple, fundamental out look on life, dating back to the time of my Concrete Manifesto (1953).”
Öyvind Fahlström was greatly under-recognized during his lifetime; however, critical interest in his work has recently exploded on the international and national scene, as demonstrated by the current retrospectives and catalogues in progress in Europe and his selection for inclusion in Documenta X, the world’s most prestigious art exposition (1997). Fahlström is viewed by many to be a progenitor of Pop Art, Installation Art and genres of political art. His work, critically received as avant·garde and socially responsible, has influenced generations of younger artists.
This exhibition traveled to six other educational institutions: the Haggerty Museum of Art (Marquette University), Selby Galleries (Ringling School of Art and Design), Gibson Art Galleries (State University of New York), The Mesaros Galleries (University of West Virginia), Herron Gallery (University of Indiana – Purdue), and Arizona State University Art Museum.
The exhibition was accompanied by 20-page, black-and-white and color catalog, which is currently unavailable.
EXHIBITION CHECKLIST
Oyvind Fahlström
$108 Bill, 1971
Two-color lithograph, 26 x 19 in.
$108 Bill, 1973
One-color silkscreen, 12 x 9 in.
“Africa” Model, 1974
Color silkscreen, 39 1/4 x 27 1/2 in.
Column no. 1 (Wonder Bread), 1972
Offset lithograph, 27 15/16 x 23 3/16 in.
Column no. 2 (Picasso 90), 1973
Twenty-six color silkscreen, 29 15/16 x 22 in.
Column no. 3, (Chile F), 1974
Color silkscreen, 39 3/16 x 27 3/8 in.
Column no. 4 (IB-affair), 1974
Twenty-six color silkscreen, 29 7/8 x 22 3/16 in.
Dr. Livingstone Collage, 1974
Color silkscreen, 39 3/16 x 27 in.
Eddie (Sylvie’s Brother) in the Desert, 1966
Color silkscreen, 17 1/8 x 16 1/2 in.
Edlund, 1954
Mimeograph, 8 1/4 x 11 1/2 in.
Elements from “Masses,” 1976
Baked enamel on metal with magnets, 27 1/2 x 27 1/2 x 9/16 in.
ESSO-LSD, 1967
Manufactured plastic signs, 35 1/16 x 50 x 5 7/8 in.
My Dear White Skeleton, 1964
Color lithograph, 16 1/4 x 22 7/8 in.
Nights, Winters, Years (Words by Justin Hayward), 1976
Color silkscreen, 24 13/16 x 35 3/8 in.
Notes 7 (“Gook”-masks), 1971-1975
Etching with hand coloring, 26 x 19 7/8 in.
Opera, 1968
One-color silkscreen, 7 7/8 x 36 in. (each of ten sheets)
Phase 3 of “Sitting…Five Panels,” 1974
Color silkscreen, 27 3/8 x 39 3/8 in.
Rulle (Suggestions for “The Cold War”), 1974
Color silkscreen, 27 1/2 x 39 3/16 in.
Section of World Map – A Puzzle, 1973
Color silkscreen on vinyl with magnets and metal, 20 x 32 x 1/4 in.
Seven Elements from “S.O.M.B.A.,” 1974
Color silkscreen, 39 9/16 x 27 3/8 in.
Simplicity, 1974
Color silkscreen, 39 x 27 1/2 in.
Sitting…Dominoes, 1966
Color silkscreen on vinyl, magnets, metal and Plexiglas, 28 1/4 x 40 3/8 x 11/16 in.
Sixteen Elements from “Chile 1,” 1976-1989
Twenty-five color silkscreen on Belgian linen, 49 x 96 1/2 in.
Sketch for World Map, 1973
One-color silkscreen, 22 x 41 3/4 in.
Sketch for World Map, Part I (Americas, Pacific), 1972
Offset lithograph, 34 x 40 in.
Study for World Model (Garden), 1974
Color silkscreen, 27 1/4 x 39 1/8 in.
Untitled, 1956
Offset lithograph, 9 1/4 x 6 1/4 in.
Untitled, 1962
One-color etching, 10 1/2 x 7 3/8 in.
EXHIBITION SUPPORT
Oyvind Fahlström: The Complete Graphics and Multiples is made possible by Bank One, the School of Art and Design, the College of Architecture and the Arts, and supported in part by a grant from the Illinois Arts Council, a state agency, Arizona State University Art Museum, Haggerty Museum of Art, Herron Gallery, The Mesaros Galleries, Roland Gobson Galleries, and Selby Gallery.
ARTIST BIOGRAPHY
Öyvind Fahlström (1928–1976) was a Swedish Multimedia artist whose prints, paintings, writings, and happenings often presented social critique with a whimsical air. Born in São Paulo (Brazil) to Scandinavian parents, Öyvind Fahlström spent a portion of his adult life in Sweden. Between 1949 and 1952 he studied art history and classical studies at the University of Stockholm and worked as a journalist. After a two-year stay in Paris (1956-1959), he moved to New York in 1961. It was during this era that he began to integrate comic strip and mass media elements into his artwork. It was also at this time that he introduced three-dimensional components into his works, often presenting playful scenarios that encouraged spectator involvement in the exhibitions. In 1962 he participated in the New Realists exhibition at the Sidney Janis Gallery, in New York City. His work was included in the 1964 Venice Biennale and he had a solo exhibition at Cordier & Ekstrom Inc., New York. In 1965 he joined the Sidney Janis Gallery. In 1966 his work Performance of Kisses Sweeter Than Wine was included in 9 Evenings: Theatre and Engineering, organized by Experiments in Art and Technology at the 26th Street Armory, New York. The same year his painting in oil on photo paper was included in a group exhibition called Erotic Art at the Sidney Janis Gallery. Fahlström had solo exhibitions at the Sidney Janis Gallery in New York City in 1967, 1969, 1973 and 1976. In 1973 he wrote a play called The Black Room, based on the Watergate scandal, and he had a retrospective at Moore College of Art Gallery, in Philadelphia, Pa. Fahlstrom died of cancer in 1976 at the age of 48. Fahlstrom’s work continues to be collected and exhibited at museums and galleries around the world.
Oyvind Fahlstrom: The Complete Graphics and Multiples
Oyvind Fahlstrom
Gallery 400, School of Art and Design,
University of Illinois at Chicago, 1999
22 pp., 11 x 8.5 in., with color and
black and white reproductions
This catalogue can be purchased for $XX.00 plus shipping by calling Gallery 400 at 312 996 6114.
PRINT COLLATERAL
Postcard: Oyvind Fahlstom: The Complete Graphics and Multiples
PRESS RELEASE
Öyvind Fahlström
The Complete Graphics and Multiples
Gallery 400
Chicago, IL
October 18–November 27, 1999
Context Talk by John Neff, Director, Curator of Collections, Terra Museum of American Art: Thursday, October 28, 1999, 5 pm
Öyvind Fahlström: The Complete Graphics and Multiples is a comprehensive survey of Öyvind Fahlström’s graphic work, including twenty-seven prints as well as multiple editions in three-dimensional object and book format. This exhibition was organized by Gallery 400 at the University of lI1inois at Chicago and Bank One, Corporation and will travel to six venues throughout the country.
Fahlström was born in Sao Paolo, Brazil in 1938 of a Norwegian father and Swedish mother. During the summer of 1939 he traveled to Sweden to visit his grandmother and was stranded by the outbreak of World War II. He attended school there until his parents return to Stockholm in 1948. Fahlström received his degree in art history and archeology from the University of Stockholm in 1952. After receiving a grant from the Swedish-American Foundation he moved to New York in 1961 where he became immediately involved with a group of artists, including Robert Rauschenberg, Jasper Johns, and Robert Morris. Fahlström died in Stockholm in 1976.
Fahlström was a visual artist, concrete poct, journalist, playwright, critic, filmmaker, and activist. A multi-media artist, Fahlström made use of many forms of distribution available, including exhibitions, books, poetry, magazines, film, opera, television, and radio. He worked in the fields of painting, graphics, sculpture, film, comics, happenings, and radio theater. He mixed all of these areas as well as creating forms of his own.
Fahlström’s main interest was in the political implications of contemporary art. Fahlström believed in art as a force for changing consciousness and the world. His works are at once political fantasies and the result of meticulous research. He scrupulously followed the economic and socio-political developments around the world, responding to ever-shifting global situations. Central to his work is a synthesis of psychodrama, truth of history, game-theory, maps, puzzles, performance, and installations. The works’ visual and textual openness help them to avoid a stern didacticism. They are poetic as well as critical.
“My basic interpretation of the concept of a game—and my artistic use of it—is therefore not evolved from the strategy theories of Neumann, Hemann Kahn, etc. I am more inclined to refer to Cage’s method of composition, and psychologists such as T. Leary and E. Berne. But above all, the idea of the game for me is a simple, fundamental outlook on life, dating back to the time of my Concrete Manifesfo (1953).” 1