19 PROPERTY FROM A PRIVATE AMERICAN COLLECTION Ed Ruscha Porch Crop 2001 acrylic on canvas 64 x 72 in. (162.6 x 182.9 cm) Signed and dated "Ed Ruscha 2001" on the reverse. This work is Ed Ruscha's first use of a palindrome in a painting.
Provenance Gagosian Gallery, New York Exhibited New York, Gagosian Gallery, Ed Ruscha Paintings, May 10 - June 15, 2002 Strasbourg, Musée d'art Moderne et Contemporain, L'Horizon Chimérique, Ed Ruscha — Jean-Marc Bustamante May 11 - September 9, 2007 Literature A. Gopnik, Ed Ruscha Paintings, Gagosian Gallery, New York, 2002, p. 16 (illustrated), cover (illustrated) G. Nicholson, "Ed Is on No Side," Modern Painters, 2003, p. 54 (illustrated) C. McLaughlin, "On the Road to the Venice Biennale with One of America's Most Iconic Artists," Insider, 2005, p. 11 (illustrated) L'Horizon Chimérique, Ed Ruscha — Jean-Marc Bustamante exh. cat., Musée d'art Moderne et Contemporain, Strasbourg, 2007, p. 73 (illustrated) R. Dean & L. Turvey, Edward Ruscha: Catalogue Raisonné of the Paintings; Volume Six: 1998 – 2003, New York: Gagosian Gallery, 2013, no. P2001.23, p. 252 (illustrated) Catalogue Essay “I’m not really painting mountains, but an idea of mountains.” Ed Ruscha Ed Ruscha’s text-based paintings have revolutionized the relationship between the visual and the semiotic. As a West Coast artist, Ruscha fully embraced the visual culture of Los Angeles and both its natural and artificial landscapes. This made him a leading figure in the early emergence of the West Coast Pop Art scene. Inspired by the text based works of fellow Pop artists Jasper Johns and Robert Rauschenberg Ruscha pursued a lifelong artistic exploration into the formal elements of printed text and its fluid relationship to the visual image. The present lot, Porch Crop, 2001, the first palindrome painting created by the artist, is a splendid and imposing composition that fully represents the artist’s determined mastery of color and form. By culling words, images and phrases that have been imprinted in his memory and that are found in mass media (print culture, advertising billboards, etc.), his work often serves as a visual encyclopedia of American culture. The artist has said, “Some [words] are found, ready-made, some are dreams, some come from newspapers. They are finished by blind faith. No matter if I've seen it on television or read it in the newspaper, my mind seems to wrap itself around that thing until it's done.” (Ed Ruscha in J. Sterbak "Premeditated: An Interview with Ed Ruscha " Real Life Magazine, Summer 1985) Hollywood and its visual symbols have remained at the forefront of Ruscha’s imagery. The present lot, painted in 2001, depicts the crisp, snow covered mountains associated with the famous Paramount Pictures logo. The pyramidal mountain has been Paramount’s logo since it was founded in 1912 and has become synonymous with the opening credits of iconic American films. The present lot depicts a sharply defined mountain range rendered in varying hues of azure. White sunlight hits the top ridges of the mountains, highlighting the creases of snow that have accumulated at the greatest heights. The mountain range in this work is not identical to the Paramount logo, which has been modified over time. As if speaking to Hollywood directly, Ruscha imposes the stenciled palindrome “Porch Crop” over the scenic view. Porch Crop represents Ruscha’s first use of a palindrome - a word in which the letters read identically forwards and backwards - in painting and the connotations are multiplicitous, as “cropping” is central to cinematic editing, while the idea of a porch crop conjures a leisurely view of the mountains. The deep blues of the glossy landscape and icy white letters emit a cool, consumer-driven image, but the quality of the typography is below what one may call “industry standards.” The picture balances the sublime majesty of the mountainous motif with its commonplace commercial appropriation. The integrity of the natural wonder is modified, even defaced and compromised, by the neutral presence of the text. Ruscha explains his own complicated sense of these dramatic landscape elements: “the mountains emerged from my connection to landscape, and experienc
19 PROPERTY FROM A PRIVATE AMERICAN COLLECTION Ed Ruscha Porch Crop 2001 acrylic on canvas 64 x 72 in. (162.6 x 182.9 cm) Signed and dated "Ed Ruscha 2001" on the reverse. This work is Ed Ruscha's first use of a palindrome in a painting.
Provenance Gagosian Gallery, New York Exhibited New York, Gagosian Gallery, Ed Ruscha Paintings, May 10 - June 15, 2002 Strasbourg, Musée d'art Moderne et Contemporain, L'Horizon Chimérique, Ed Ruscha — Jean-Marc Bustamante May 11 - September 9, 2007 Literature A. Gopnik, Ed Ruscha Paintings, Gagosian Gallery, New York, 2002, p. 16 (illustrated), cover (illustrated) G. Nicholson, "Ed Is on No Side," Modern Painters, 2003, p. 54 (illustrated) C. McLaughlin, "On the Road to the Venice Biennale with One of America's Most Iconic Artists," Insider, 2005, p. 11 (illustrated) L'Horizon Chimérique, Ed Ruscha — Jean-Marc Bustamante exh. cat., Musée d'art Moderne et Contemporain, Strasbourg, 2007, p. 73 (illustrated) R. Dean & L. Turvey, Edward Ruscha: Catalogue Raisonné of the Paintings; Volume Six: 1998 – 2003, New York: Gagosian Gallery, 2013, no. P2001.23, p. 252 (illustrated) Catalogue Essay “I’m not really painting mountains, but an idea of mountains.” Ed Ruscha Ed Ruscha’s text-based paintings have revolutionized the relationship between the visual and the semiotic. As a West Coast artist, Ruscha fully embraced the visual culture of Los Angeles and both its natural and artificial landscapes. This made him a leading figure in the early emergence of the West Coast Pop Art scene. Inspired by the text based works of fellow Pop artists Jasper Johns and Robert Rauschenberg Ruscha pursued a lifelong artistic exploration into the formal elements of printed text and its fluid relationship to the visual image. The present lot, Porch Crop, 2001, the first palindrome painting created by the artist, is a splendid and imposing composition that fully represents the artist’s determined mastery of color and form. By culling words, images and phrases that have been imprinted in his memory and that are found in mass media (print culture, advertising billboards, etc.), his work often serves as a visual encyclopedia of American culture. The artist has said, “Some [words] are found, ready-made, some are dreams, some come from newspapers. They are finished by blind faith. No matter if I've seen it on television or read it in the newspaper, my mind seems to wrap itself around that thing until it's done.” (Ed Ruscha in J. Sterbak "Premeditated: An Interview with Ed Ruscha " Real Life Magazine, Summer 1985) Hollywood and its visual symbols have remained at the forefront of Ruscha’s imagery. The present lot, painted in 2001, depicts the crisp, snow covered mountains associated with the famous Paramount Pictures logo. The pyramidal mountain has been Paramount’s logo since it was founded in 1912 and has become synonymous with the opening credits of iconic American films. The present lot depicts a sharply defined mountain range rendered in varying hues of azure. White sunlight hits the top ridges of the mountains, highlighting the creases of snow that have accumulated at the greatest heights. The mountain range in this work is not identical to the Paramount logo, which has been modified over time. As if speaking to Hollywood directly, Ruscha imposes the stenciled palindrome “Porch Crop” over the scenic view. Porch Crop represents Ruscha’s first use of a palindrome - a word in which the letters read identically forwards and backwards - in painting and the connotations are multiplicitous, as “cropping” is central to cinematic editing, while the idea of a porch crop conjures a leisurely view of the mountains. The deep blues of the glossy landscape and icy white letters emit a cool, consumer-driven image, but the quality of the typography is below what one may call “industry standards.” The picture balances the sublime majesty of the mountainous motif with its commonplace commercial appropriation. The integrity of the natural wonder is modified, even defaced and compromised, by the neutral presence of the text. Ruscha explains his own complicated sense of these dramatic landscape elements: “the mountains emerged from my connection to landscape, and experienc
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.jpg "Quelle: Christie's")
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