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De Andrea, John
Woman on Bed
1974
| Object description | Polyester, fiberglass, oil paint |
|---|---|
| Object category | sculpture |
| Dimensions |
Objekt:
height: 20 cm,
width: 197 cm,
depth: 101 cm,
height: 15 cm,
width: 190 cm,
depth: 94 cm,
height: 35 cm,
width: 220 cm,
depth: 111,5 cm,
height: 12 cm,
width: 250 cm,
depth: 140 cm,
height: 35 cm,
width: 197 cm,
depth: 101 cm,
height: 9 cm,
width: 250 cm,
depth: 140 cm
|
| Year of acquisition | 1991 |
| Inventory number | ÖL-Stg 211/0 |
| Creditline | mumok - Museum moderner Kunst Stiftung Ludwig Wien, Leihgabe der Österreichischen Ludwig-Stiftung |
| Rights reference | De Andrea, John |
| Further information about the person | De Andrea, John [GND] |
| Literature |
Museum moderner Kunst Stiftung Ludwig Wien The Uncanny, by Mike Kelley, Artist The Nude. Ideal and Reality. Painting and sculpture. Paul Thek.Artist's Artist La creazione ansiosa. da Picasso a Bacon Hyper Real |
John de Andrea has been working since 1964 on sculptural reproductions of mostly girlish female figures with the highest possible degree of realism. The artist wishes his replicas to be so perfect that they appear to breathe. To achieve this, he takes plastic casts directly from the living human model. The surface of the resulting life-size plastic doppelganger is then painted with an incredible degree of realistic detail. Woman on Bed from 1974 lies before us on a mattress in a relaxed pose of the kind adopted unconsciously when asleep. Right down to the smallest pore, her appearance matches our idea of the female body: her cheeks and knees are slightly reddened, her skin lightly suntanned, and under the surface of the skin we sense the presence of fine veins. We almost feel the need to lower our voices so as not to wake her. Not separated from one another by any kind of plinth, the world of the viewer and that of the work blend into one another. It is precisely this ambivalence that interests John de Andrea when he declares that reality does not always exist the way we imagine it. But, he says, the experience that takes place between a sculpture and the viewer really is a reality.
© mumok – museum moderner kunst stiftung ludwig wien