This innocuous stack of papers--seemingly waiting to be recycled--was handmade in Robert Gober's studio. On the visible top page, he has paired an advertisement with an article about a pedestrian being hit by a car and a report about shellfish in Chile. In the ad, Gober assumes the persona of a bride; positioned in a traditional wedding portrait, he substitutes himself for a model advertising bridal gowns in The New York Times. Smiling coyly next to the caption "Having It All," the artist subverts what has been upheld as the ultimate moment of female realization. He has also commented on what he sees as the ironic nature of the wedding dress--a symbol of purity that is designed to drag along the floor in the dirt. Walker solo exhibition: Robert Gober: Sculpture + Drawing, 1999

"My works are erotically explicit, shameless. I would be happy if visitors would stand in front of my work and even feel a little ashamed because they have . . . simply believed in the project of modernism." --Kara Walker, 2001 Kara Walker's work, done in the style of silhouette portraits widely popular in the 17th and 18th centuries, has focused on an exploration of the history of slavery and of black-white race relations in the United States. Endless Conundrum, An African Anonymous Adventuress represents an expansion of this subject matter, adding an examination of the role of African tribal motifs in the genesis of modern art. These motifs played a crucial but undercredited role in Western art's move from realism to conceptual and expressive representation and in the work of such artists as Pablo Picasso, Constantin Brancusi, and Alberto Giacometti. (Brancusi's sculpture Endless Column is referenced in the title.) While the influence of African sculpture has been disputed in the case of this work, Walker clearly indicated that the debate is absurd. Commissioned by the Fondation Beyeler, a Swiss museum that exhibits African tribal sculptures alongside modernist works of art, Walker's piece asks us to examine the issue in the context of other problematic appropriations of blackness in Western culture. She portrays key works from the Beyeler's collection, including a nail fetish and Rodin's Iris, alongside African-American performer Josephine Baker, who is dancing her way out of the "exotic" banana skirt that made her famous. A resounding homage to the creativity of African and African-American cultures, Walker's work highlights the power dynamics behind the cultural exchanges, appropriations, and combinations that are part of our society today.

I like space that never stops. . . . Black is like that. Holes and boxes mean secrets and shelter.--Lee Bontecou One of the few women artists to achieve broad recognition in the 1960s, Lee Bontecou captured the public's attention in 1959, when she was 28, with a group of constructions, or assemblages, created with scrap fabric stretched over welded steel frames. Her reliefs, which simplify and emphasize the differences in practice between painting and sculpture, are attached to a frame and project out from the wall. Untitled No. 38 is a rather menacing assembly of scavenged canvas, wire, hardware, and saw blades. Inside its protruding openings are scraps of velvet that make the interior spaces seem almost endless. Bontecou has discussed the effect that the threat of nuclear war has had on her work. She describes members of her generation as having been "born into that situation in which we can end it all!" The combination of beauty and darkness in Untitled No. 38 suggests her frequently quoted aspiration to "glimpse some of the fear, hope, ugliness, beauty, and mystery that exists in us all and which hangs over all the young people of today."

I try to make art which celebrates doubt and uncertainty. Which provokes answers but doesn't give them. Which withholds absolute meaning by incorporating parasite meanings. Which suspends meaning while perpetually dispatching you toward interpretation, urging you beyond dogmatism, beyond doctrine, beyond ideology, beyond authority.--Sherrie Levine Since the early 1980s, Sherrie Levine has made a career out of re-using--or appropriating--famous works of art, often by making new versions of them and placing them in different contexts. Throughout her career, Levine has created art based on works by prominent male artists from the early 20th century in order to underscore the relative absence of women in the art world at that time. Her sources have included Walker Evans' photographs and Constantin Brancusi's sculptures. Levine's piece, entitled Fountain (after Marcel Duchamp: A. P.), is inspired by Marcel Duchamp's Fountain (1917). When Levine's Fountain is compared with Duchamp's sculpture, it is apparent that it is not an exact copy. Most notably, Duchamp's piece was an actual urinal, turned upside-down and unaltered except for his signature. He believed he could transform such mass-produced, everyday objects into artworks merely by proclaiming them so, and called them "readymades." In contrast, Levine's sculpture is a contemporary urinal cast in the sculptor's traditional precious metal, bronze. Polished to a brilliant shine, this piece is no longer a common, store-bought item; it has been transformed by the artist into a unique object.

Fluxus is not: a movement, a moment in history, an organization. Fluxus is: an idea, a kind of work, a tendency, a way of life, a changing set of people who do Fluxworks.--Dick Higgins Fluxus is a loosely affiliated international network of visual artists, new-music composers, writers, and performers who have been active since the early 1960s. Beginning with a series of festivals featuring concerts of new experimental music and other avant-garde performance, Fluxus artists reacted against the commodity status of art, its commercialization in the gallery system, and its static presentation in traditional institutions. They often rejected the concept of artistic genius and single authorship in favor of a collective spirit and a collaborative practice. Fluxus compositions or scores for performances and events involve simple actions, ideas, and objects from everyday life. Some scores, such as those in George Brecht's Water Yam (1972), were printed on cards and then packaged into plastic boxes and sold as inexpensive multiples. These scores call for open-ended actions and events that can be performed by anyone at any time in any place. Also on view is Yoko Ono's Invitation to Participate in a Water Event, in which she invited people to bring containers to her 1971 exhibition. These vessels were filled with water, displayed in the show, and labeled as collaborative works of art. Sometimes a documentation or artifact from a Fluxus event became a work of art, a material presence that referred to an absent action or previous performance. Alison Knowles' Journal of the Identical Lunch (1971), documents her ritual noontime performances at a New York diner with various artists and friends. In Dick Higgins' ongoing series, The Thousand Symphonies, he composes musical scores with bullet holes and paint on sheet music. The result is both a documentation of the artist's action and a work of visual art. Incorporating musical compositions, concrete poetry, visual art, and writing, Fluxus performances embody Higgins' idea of "intermedia"--a dialogue between two or more media to create a third, entirely new art form. Fluxus performance also incorporates actions and objects, artists and non-artists, art and everyday life in an attempt to find something "significant in the insignificant." The influence of this highly experimental, spontaneous, often humorous form of performance art prevailed through the 1970s and has been rediscovered by a younger generation of artists working today.

This sculpture by Sherrie Levine, entitled Fountain (after Marcel Duchamp: A.P.) is inspired by Marcel Duchamp's Fountain (1917). Since the early 1980s, Levine has made a career out of re-using--or appropriating--famous works of art, often by making new versions of them and placing them in different contexts. Throughout her career, Levine has created art based on works by prominent male artists from the early 20th century in order to underscore the relative absence of women in the art world at that time. In addition to Duchamp, her sources include Walker Evans' photographs and Constantin Brancusi's sculptures. What's so special about a copy of a famous work of art? If you compare Levine's Fountain with Duchamp's sculpture, you'll notice that it's not an exact copy. Most notably, Duchamp's piece was an actual urinal, turned upside down and unaltered except for his signature. He believed he could transform such mass-produced, everyday objects into artworks merely by proclaiming them so. He called these works "readymades." In contrast, Levine's Fountain is a contemporary urinal cast in a precious metal--bronze, the traditional material for casting sculpture. Polished to a brilliant shine, this work is no longer a common, store-bought object but something quite unique. Levine's Fountain is placed at the entrance to the permanent collection exhibition galleries as a hint at the changes that have taken place in art over our century. Moreover, this sculpture shows that today's artistic innovations continue to be built on the achievements of the past. Sherrie Levine talks about her work "I try to make art which celebrates doubt and uncertainty. Which provokes answers but doesn't give them. Which withholds absolute meaning by incorporating parasite meanings. Which suspends meaning while perpetually dispatching you toward interpretation, urging you beyond dogmatism, beyond doctrine, beyond ideology, beyond authority."

"Constantin Brancusi held a modernist belief that primal innocence and formal simplicity were linked. From 1909 until 1933 he employed the oval form again and again, captivated by its cosmological flavor--simultaneously suggesting the fragility of an egg and an infant' s head. My favorite of these sculptures is "Newborn", the image of a bawling child, its mouth wide open, suggesting the shock of the birth."--Sherrie Levine Since the early 1980s, Levine has appropriated--co-opted or reused--famous works of art that she has manipulated and tailored for her artistic purposes. Throughout her career, Levine has created art based on works by prominent 20th-century male artists in order to underscore the relative absence of women in the history of art, particularly the modernist tradition. Newborn is a rebirth of the Constantin Brancusi sculpture from 1915 with which it shares its title. The smooth egg-shaped form is interrupted only by a stylized ridge and sliced oval plane suggesting the nose and open mouth of a crying infant. Originally displayed on a grand piano, Newborn invokes Marcel Duchamp's "readymades"--prefabricated objects that became works of art because he declared them to be. Levine's cast glass head questions the notion of authenticity and authorship--issues that are constantly raised and challenged throughout the 20th century.

Since 1980, Levine has placed her work in a deliberately ambiguous relationship to the artist-heroes of 20th-century modernism. Her work blatantly acknowledges its existence as the by-product of that which preceded it and, consequently, functions as both critique and object. Levine's work conflates appropriation with authorship as she "borrows" from painters, sculptors, and here, an architect. Her appropriation of Gerrit Rietveld's "garden furniture" from the 1930s is neither clearly functional nor purely sculptural. Rietveld's theory of furniture design focuses on space and the space carved out, or outlined, by his creations. Levine's work defines Rietveld's design as sculpture, a "high" art form. However, the work is an exact replica and is therefore functional. This irony allows us to question the work of art as commodity and the institutional framework in which value judgments and meaning are created and maintained.

This tour looks at works of art that explore issues of gender and gender identity. Participants learn that many contemporary artists explore these issues in their work, and in a variety of ways. This activity could be used in the Walker Art Center galleries, Minneapolis Sculpture Garden, or in the classroom with a selection of images from Art Collector. The artworks included in the activity are suggestions only and instructors may choose different artworks to accompany the discussion questions. This activity is from the Living in Our Time section of the Tour Guide Tool Kit.