ART GALLERY

Photograph by Robert McKeever, courtesy of Gagosian Gallery ©Oldenburg

Giant Soft Drum Set: In the late 1950’s Claes Oldenburg was making environmental art from 'found objects' picked up in the street, or participating in 'Happenings'. By the 1960’s his work turned to replications, in plaster and other materials, of common mass consumer items for his The Store. Such three-dimensional creations gradually took on an oversize scale and, as they were clad in soft plastic, came to be called 'soft sculpture'. Giant Soft Drum Set is an example of Oldenburg’s 'soft sculpture'. The plastic elements of the drums sag with the force of gravity, losing their original shape. For Oldenburg, this was suggestive of the organs of the human body. He also said that he was inspired by scenery in Aspen, Colorado, that the 'drum set' was suggested by thunderclouds rising above the mountains and roars of thunder that went along with them. Giant Soft Drum Set pre-figures Oldenburg’s monumental outdoor sculptures of everyday objects that followed with the collaboration of Coosje van Bruggen.