Lot 35
35
Claes Oldenburg (B. 1929)
Property from the Estate of Charles H. Carpenter, Jr.
Claes Oldenburg (B. 1929)

Popsicle, Hamburger, Price

Details
Claes Oldenburg (B. 1929)
Popsicle, Hamburger, Price
signed with initals and dated 'C.O. 1961-62' (on the reverse of each element)
sailcloth, foam rubber and enamel
41 x 16 x 11 in. (104.2 x 40.7 x 28 cm.)
Executed in 1961-1962.
Provenance
Acquired from the artist, 1962
Literature
L. Lippard, Praeger World of Art Paperbacks, p. 112, no. 89 (illustrated).
Exhibited
New York, Green Gallery, Claes Oldenburg, September 1962, no. 15.
Pittsburgh, Carnegie Museum of Art and New York, Whitney Museum of American Art, Charles H. Carpenter, Jr.: The Odyssey of a Collector, March 1996-March 1997, p. 64 (illustrated in color).
Ridgefield, Conneticut, The Aldrich Museum of Contemporary Art, Fifty Years of Supporting the New: The Charles H. Carpenter Jr. Collection, September-December 2002.

Lot Essay

The work of Claes Oldenburg intrigued Charles Carpenter in the late 1950s and prompted a visit to the artist's studio. In 1961, he responded to the artist's request that he pay his $50 -per-month studio rent in exchange of a work of art. As was his custom, Carpenter had no hesitation to help a promising artist in need. They had several enjoyable conversations and visits at lunchtime when Carpenter brought sandwiches to the studio from a nearby delicatessen. He asked for a wall piece and Oldenburg made him a plaster sandwich on wire mesh in 1961. Soon afterward, Oldenburg opened his theatrical Store in the winter of 1961 and had a successful show at the Green Gallery in the fall of 1962. Carpenter purchased Popsicle, Hamburger, Price (1961-62) a work shown at the Green Gallery on one of his visits to the artist.

--Susan Larsen

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