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拍品专文
Martin Wong’s Study for La Vida is a sister painting for what is widely regarded to be the artist’s most important canvas: La Vida (1988, Yale University Art Museum). Like its institutional counterpart, the present work is both a celebration and commemoration of the vibrant Loisaida community - the Lower East Side of New York City. Through the 20th Century, this poor, largely Black and Puerto Rican community had developed into a vibrant and rebellious community populated by artists, writers, poets and musicians. Many are featured in this painting. But by 1988, the neighborhood was already beginning to feel the effects of gentrification, and within a decade the community had all but disappeared—leaving Study for La Vida as a marvelous monument to one of the greatest cultural era’s in the history of New York.
Featuring a tenement building on the corner of Stanton and Ridge streets, the painting depicts the vibrant community that lived in this part of town. This particular building was across the street from Wong’s own apartment and, as the artist did not own a television, he would often gaze out at the scene across the street and watch the comings and goings of his neighbors. La Vida is populated with the faces of local residents, artists, musicians, and poets. Many are recognizable, framed by the artist’s iconic brick façade: these include the graffiti artist Sharp (in the baseball cap, in the center), his girlfriend Dotty (the woman sporting the gold hooped earrings on the far left), and the artist LA2—also known as Angel Ortiz—in the bright white t-shirt. The police at bottom left are discussing a recent mugging with Martin’s landlord. Most importantly however, is the figure of Miguel Piñero, the poet and playwright who was Wong’s friend, collaborator, supporter, and onetime lover who had died just a few months previously in June 1988. His distinctive figure is featured twice, once standing on the fire escape in the upper portion of the canvas and then again in the extreme upper right window. Thus, La Vida is not only a powerful and playful depiction of a neighborhood, but also a joyful commemoration of the poet and local figurehead who insisted in his ‘A Lower Eastside Poem’: ". . . let all eyes be dry when they scatter my ashes thru the Lower Eastside."
“He was an artist of the local,” writes poet and critic John Yau. “He documented the Hispanic neighborhood, as well as recorded different aspects of his identity as an openly gay, Chinese American with desires, memories, all of which were at odds with mainstream America” (J. Yau, ‘All the World’s a Stage: The Art of Martin Wong,’ in A. S. Bessa (ed.), Martin Wong: Human Instamatic, exh. cat. Bronx Museum, New York, 2015, p.41). The neighborhood would go onto feature in many of the artist’s most important paintings including Attorney Street (Handball Court with Autobiographical Poem by Piñero) (1982-84)—the first of his paintings of the neighborhood—now in the permanent collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, and Portrait of Mikey Piñero at Ridge Street and Stanton.
Both the performative nature of composition and the narrative contained within the lives of each of his neighbors framed by the windows lend the painting a highly theatrical air. He loved the drama and various life predicaments that the buildings witnessed, and thus the building becomes something of a stage set upon which the individual characters play out their own roles. Interestingly, Wong had experience of designing both stage sets and costumes for theatre productions in his native San Francisco, such as for a performance by the avant-garde psychedelic hippie theater group and their offshoot, the Angels of Light.
By 1988, the year that Study for La Vida was painted, the Loisaida was rapidly gentrifying, and the unique way of life that it had generated was starting to disappear. As well as Wong, the neighborhood produced a generation of ground-breaking American artists—including Jean-Michel Basquiat and Keith Haring—plus countless musicians, poets, and playwrights. Wong’s unique perspective and painterly talent captured their lived experience. His paintings reflect both his unique perspective of being a gay Chinese-American artist during the 1970s and 1980s, and also the architecture of the urban landscape of the Lower East Side and represent a voice that is so often missing from the art historical cannon of the twentieth century.
Featuring a tenement building on the corner of Stanton and Ridge streets, the painting depicts the vibrant community that lived in this part of town. This particular building was across the street from Wong’s own apartment and, as the artist did not own a television, he would often gaze out at the scene across the street and watch the comings and goings of his neighbors. La Vida is populated with the faces of local residents, artists, musicians, and poets. Many are recognizable, framed by the artist’s iconic brick façade: these include the graffiti artist Sharp (in the baseball cap, in the center), his girlfriend Dotty (the woman sporting the gold hooped earrings on the far left), and the artist LA2—also known as Angel Ortiz—in the bright white t-shirt. The police at bottom left are discussing a recent mugging with Martin’s landlord. Most importantly however, is the figure of Miguel Piñero, the poet and playwright who was Wong’s friend, collaborator, supporter, and onetime lover who had died just a few months previously in June 1988. His distinctive figure is featured twice, once standing on the fire escape in the upper portion of the canvas and then again in the extreme upper right window. Thus, La Vida is not only a powerful and playful depiction of a neighborhood, but also a joyful commemoration of the poet and local figurehead who insisted in his ‘A Lower Eastside Poem’: ". . . let all eyes be dry when they scatter my ashes thru the Lower Eastside."
“He was an artist of the local,” writes poet and critic John Yau. “He documented the Hispanic neighborhood, as well as recorded different aspects of his identity as an openly gay, Chinese American with desires, memories, all of which were at odds with mainstream America” (J. Yau, ‘All the World’s a Stage: The Art of Martin Wong,’ in A. S. Bessa (ed.), Martin Wong: Human Instamatic, exh. cat. Bronx Museum, New York, 2015, p.41). The neighborhood would go onto feature in many of the artist’s most important paintings including Attorney Street (Handball Court with Autobiographical Poem by Piñero) (1982-84)—the first of his paintings of the neighborhood—now in the permanent collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, and Portrait of Mikey Piñero at Ridge Street and Stanton.
Both the performative nature of composition and the narrative contained within the lives of each of his neighbors framed by the windows lend the painting a highly theatrical air. He loved the drama and various life predicaments that the buildings witnessed, and thus the building becomes something of a stage set upon which the individual characters play out their own roles. Interestingly, Wong had experience of designing both stage sets and costumes for theatre productions in his native San Francisco, such as for a performance by the avant-garde psychedelic hippie theater group and their offshoot, the Angels of Light.
By 1988, the year that Study for La Vida was painted, the Loisaida was rapidly gentrifying, and the unique way of life that it had generated was starting to disappear. As well as Wong, the neighborhood produced a generation of ground-breaking American artists—including Jean-Michel Basquiat and Keith Haring—plus countless musicians, poets, and playwrights. Wong’s unique perspective and painterly talent captured their lived experience. His paintings reflect both his unique perspective of being a gay Chinese-American artist during the 1970s and 1980s, and also the architecture of the urban landscape of the Lower East Side and represent a voice that is so often missing from the art historical cannon of the twentieth century.