Arched Soft Screw as Building
started 1975, published 1976
Image not available — this artwork is under copyright
View on museum website →Medium
lithograph on Roll Arches wove paper
Dimensions
sheet: 171.45 × 114.3 cm (67 1/2 × 45 in.)
Classification
Department
CG-W
Museum
National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.
Credit
Gift of Gemini G.E.L. and the Artist
Accession Number
1981.5.130
Art Historical Context
Claes Oldenburg's *Arched Soft Screw as Building* (started 1975, published1976) exemplifies the artist's playful Pop Art sensibility, transforming everyday hardware—a humble screw—into a monumental architectural fantasy. Oldenburg, a pioneer of the 1960s Pop movement, gained fame for his oversized "soft sculptures" of mundane objects, rendered in pliable vinyl or canvas to evoke whimsy and anthropomorphism. Here, the screw arches skyward like a surreal skyscraper, blurring the lines between consumer culture, sculpture, and urban design. This large-scale lithograph, printed on luxurious Roll A...
About the Artist
Claes Oldenburg
Claes Oldenburg, born January 28, 1929, in Stockholm, Sweden, to diplomat Gösta Oldenburg and Sigrid Elisabeth Lindforss, spent much of his childhood abroad before his family settled in Chicago in 1936, where his father served as Swedish consul general. He attended the Latin School of Chicago, then studied literature and art history at Yale University from 1946 to 1950, followed by classes at the ...