Art Nouveau Fish Bowl
Towards the end of 1960, Brainard left his native Tulsa for New York City, where he soon saw the groundbreaking Art of Assemblage at the Museum of Modern Art (1961). Inspired by the artists in the exhibition—among them Pablo Picasso and Kurt Schwitters—who layered the materials of everyday life in their work, Brainard soon began making assemblages of his own. By the mid-1970s, when this work was made, Brainard had established strong ties with the group of New York poets around John Ashbery (b. 1927). He had also developed a forceful amphetamine habit, which kept him awake for days in his studio where he would make endless collages and drawings from the piles of scrap paper that littered the floor.
Artwork Details
- Title: Art Nouveau Fish Bowl
- Artist: Joe Brainard (American, Salem, Arkansas 1942–1994 New York)
- Date: 1975
- Medium: Cut and pasted, printed and painted papers, opaque watercolor, with traces of graphite on paper
- Dimensions: 6 1/16 × 4 5/16 in. (15.4 × 10.9 cm)
- Classification: Drawings
- Credit Line: Gift of Stanley Posthorn, in memory of the artist, 1997
- Object Number: 1997.404.9
- Rights and Reproduction: © Estate of Joe Brainard
- Curatorial Department: Modern and Contemporary Art
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Joe Brainard
1970–71
Joe Brainard
1976
Joe Brainard
1975
Joe Brainard
1976
Joe Brainard
1975
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