"Untitled" (L.A.)
"Untitled" (L.A.)
Artist
Felix Gonzalez-Torres
(1957 - 1996)
Date1991
MediumGreen candies in clear wrappers, endless supply
DimensionsOverall dimensions vary with installation
Original dimensions: approximately 192 x 14 × 1 1/2 in. (487.7 × 35.6 × 3.8 cm)
Original weight: 50 lb. (22.7 kg)
Original dimensions: approximately 192 x 14 × 1 1/2 in. (487.7 × 35.6 × 3.8 cm)
Original weight: 50 lb. (22.7 kg)
ClassificationsInstallation
Credit LineJointly owned by Art Bridges and Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art
Accession number
2015.29
On View
Not on viewCollections
Label TextYou are invited to take a piece of candy. Made of an everyday, non-art material, “Untitled” (L.A.) is designed to suggest a wide range of meanings. Unlike most works of art, this one invites you to touch, taste, and actively engage.
A Cuban-born American citizen, Gonzalez-Torres moved to New York City in the early 1980s, where he joined the artist collaborative Group Material. Using materials like candy, lightbulbs, and paper, he invited renewed attention to the objects in our everyday lives.
In Los Angeles in 1991—the same year he created “Untitled” (L.A.)—Gonzalez-Torres’s longtime partner Ross Laycock died of complications from AIDS. Given this fact, the artist’s candy spills have often been interpreted as metaphors for the human body ravaged by illness. As the candy pile depletes, so too did Laycock’s diseased body. By providing for the endless replenishment of the candy, the artist symbolically grants the body everlasting life. Gonzalez-Torres himself avoided assigning definite meanings, choosing instead to keep his work open-ended.
