b. 1957, Cuba
d. 1996 in New York City
The revolutionary work of the Cuban-American artist Felix Gonzalez-Torres could be said to negate the traditional materialist conception of art. Building on the emphasis of the artistic idea over the aesthetic art object as extolled by happenings and conceptual art in the 1960s, Gonzalez-Torres's work exists as fleeting acts when viewer and art come together. One of his most celebrated pieces comprises mouth-watering sweets spread across the floor. At times they lie together in one corner, at others, as here, the cellophane-wrapped sweets form a glistening blue carpet on the museum floor.
Untitled (Blue Placebo), 1991, is a conceptual work. The owner of the piece receives a piece of paper on which instructions for use are set out. These instructions say that for exhibition purposes, the work must consist of 130 kilos of mints, wrapped in blue cellophane. Gonzalez-Torres transgresses the strict directions of the museum and encourages the public to play a part in the piece, because it is only by eating the blue-wrapped sweeties the public can share in the intrinsic meaning of the work. The year that work was made marked in addition the death artist's partner Ross from AIDS. The weight of the sweets matches the combined weight of Gonzalez-Torres and Ross. Because the museum must not replace sweets taken by the public, the work's symbolism reflects the artist's great personal bereavement. The bracketed title encourages interpretation along these lines too. ‘Placebo' is a Latin term meaning ‘I shall be pleasing/acceptable'. In medical terms, a placebo is something without recognized effect, but which nonetheless appears to work in some cases. This is Gonzalez-Torres criticizing the treatment offered AIDS patients. He wants to involve the viewer in a process which highlights human vulnerability and life's impermanence. Given the context, putting a sweet into your mouth is an act of pregnant significance where the religious connotations should be plain.
Gonzalez-Torres is also known for his exhibitions of piles of paper of various sizes and with different motifs, vertical strings of light bulbs, glistening curtains through which the public can pass, textual works and photos. In 1991 he showed a large photograph mounted on a New York billboard. It was of a bed, with the imprint of two bodies. It is a first-rate example of the untraditional route Gonzalez-Torres takes to express his often deeply personal work, as if meditating on the idea of art and artwork in an institutional framework. Gonzalez-Torres's ground-breaking conceptual art has had an enormous impact on the younger generation of artists who in their idiosyncratic ways, include the viewer in social, economic, aesthetic or personal issues.
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