Object number2008.27.17

Proposed Colossal Monument for End of Navy Pier, Chicago: Side-view Mirror

Date1967

Artist Claes Oldenburg (American, 1929 - 2022)

CultureAmerican

MediumCrayon and wash on paper

DimensionsSheet: 7 1/4 x 9 5/8 in. (18.42 x 24.45 cm)

Credit LineGift of Leon Despres in memory of Marian Alschuler Despres, class of 1930

On View

Not on view

Period20th c

Classification(s)

Drawings and Watercolors

InscribedAcross bottom; "Mirror on Navy Pier"

Label TextClaes Oldenburg, a key Pop Art figure in the United States, examined the humor and irony found in contradiction and disruption. Initially, in the early 1960s, he created painted plaster copies of everyday objects and explored performance art through his series of Happenings. After traveling abroad and moving into a large studio in New York City in 1965, Oldenburg became interested in monuments as a concept within the broader cityscape. In his Proposals project, he drafted scenes that introduced ordinary objects – made monumental in scale – into metropolitan landscapes. In this particular proposal, he places a car’s side-view mirror, scaled up, on Chicago’s Navy Pier. By placing such an object near the popular waterfront, its shining reflection could perhaps be useful for the river traffic, or instead, frustrating for land-dwellers. The purpose of such an installation could be seen as beneficial or obtrusive, representing Oldenburg’s understanding of the shift in the purpose of monuments; he explained that his proposals “reintroduce the idea of the monument as [...] disruption in the city.”

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