Ed Kienholz

This poster is for an exhibition of the work of Edward Kienholz at the Galerie Maeght in Paris. Kienholz was born in 1927 in Fairfield, WA. During his youth he learned skills such as carpentry and engineering, that he would later incorporate into his artwork. He briefly attended Eastern Washington College of Education and Whitworth College, but he did not earn a degree. He did not study art in school, but pursued painting on his own. He moved to Los Angeles in 1953, where he established himself as an artist. He was a self-taught sculptor known for his elaborate found-object assemblages, which convey a harsh scrutiny of American society. In large-scale installations with life-sized figures and built environments, Kienholz made his work physically and emotionally immersive, breaking down the comfort zone between the art and its audience. Echoing the degraded, filthy quality of his materials, his sculptures and tableaux often evoke American society's sexual prudery, political corruption, moral hypocrisy, and oppression of marginalized groups. Due to its controversial subject matter and its unflinching portrayal of sex and violence, Kienholz's work was frequently the target of debates over obscenity and the appropriate use of public funding for the arts. From 1972, he frequently collaborated with his fifth wife, Nancy Reddin. He declared that all works made since 1972, the year they had married, should be considered collaborations and credited simply to "Kienholz." Kienholz died suddenly from a heart attack at age 67. Per his request, his wife buried him in Idaho (with a dollar and a deck of cards in his pocket) in one of his own installations, a 1940 Packard, which also contained his dog's ashes and a bottle of wine.