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Claes Oldenburg
Blue Legs, 1961

In the winter of 1961-62, Oldenburg opened the Store, also known as the Ray Gun Manufacturing Co., which he set up in an actual storefront on East Second Street in New York. A combination of exhibition, performance, and garage sale, the Store offered for purchase various items — including candy bars, a bridal mannequin, cakes, and Blue Legs — all fashioned out of painted plaster over chicken wire. The artist could replenish the stock, if necessary, by simply making more items in the studio portion of the space in the rear.

Oldenburg’s replicated consumer goods could never, with their crude surfaces and straight-from-the-can paint application, pass for the real thing. His radical assertion, however, was that such foodstuffs, clothing, and miscellany viable subjects for art.

Artwork Info

Artwork title
Blue Legs
Artist name
Claes Oldenburg
Date created
1961
Classification
sculpture
Medium
plaster, muslin, wire, and enamel paint
Dimensions
61 in. × 41 in. × 9 in. (154.94 cm × 104.14 cm × 22.86 cm)
Date acquired
1964
Credit
Collection SFMOMA
Anonymous gift
Copyright
© Estate of Claes Oldenburg
Permanent URL
https://www.sfmoma.org/artwork/64.65
Artwork status
Not on view at this time.

Other Works by Claes Oldenburg

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