Label Text
Julian Schnabel came to prominence in the early 1980s as a leading figure of Neo-expressionism, a group of artists including Jean-Michel Basquiat and Francesco Clemente, who broke from Minimalism and Conceptualism to concentrate on figurative painting. The Death of Fashion is from a series of large works that brought Schnabel to the attention of the art world, and its incorporation of broken crockery became his signature style. The work’s surface is a mosaic of thick painting, fragmented imagery, and smashed dishes, resulting in a dramatic effect that matches the painting’s epic size. Imbedded into the paint and canvas, the plates contain many thematic references, from discarded remnants of the past to violent domestic discord. The work’s title is a modified version of the title of an article accounting the death of a fashion model, although the painting is not meant to be illustrative of the story.
Published ReferencesAN UNCOMMON VISION: THE DES MOINES ART CENTER, Des Moines Art Center, 1998, ref. p.245, color ill. pp.244 & 245
Schnabel was born in Brooklyn, New York, in 1951. He received his B.F.A. from the University of Houston in 1973 and entered the Whitney Museum of American Art Independent Study Program the same year.
Source: News, MArch/April 1992.
Julian Schnabel came to prominence in the early 1980s as a leading figure of Neo-expressionism, a group of artists including Jean-Michel Basquiat and Francesco Clemente, who broke from Minimalism and Conceptualism to concentrate on figurative painting. The Death of Fashion is from a series of large works that brought Schnabel to the attention of the art world, and its incorporation of broken crockery became his signature style. The work’s surface is a mosaic of thick painting, fragmented imagery, and smashed dishes, resulting in a dramatic effect that matches the painting’s epic size. Imbedded into the paint and canvas, the plates contain many thematic references, from discarded remnants of the past to violent domestic discord. The work’s title is a modified version of the title of an article accounting the death of a fashion model, although the painting is not meant to be illustrative of the story.
Published ReferencesAN UNCOMMON VISION: THE DES MOINES ART CENTER, Des Moines Art Center, 1998, ref. p.245, color ill. pp.244 & 245
DimensionsOverall: 95 1/4 × 120 × 13 in. (241.9 × 304.8 × 33 cm)
Accession Number 1991.47
Classificationspainting
CopyrightARS
ProvenanceArtist. Robert Feldman, New York [acquired by 1979]. Doris and Charles Saatchi, London [acquired by 1984]; (Gagosian Gallery, New York); Des Moines Art Center [purchased from the previous, 1991]
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