Lucas Samaras (Greek: Λουκάς Σαμαράς; September 14, 1936 – March 7, 2024) was a Greek-born American photographer, sculptor, and painter.[1]
Lucas Samaras | |
|---|---|
Λουκάς Σαμαράς | |
 Self-portrait, Photo-Transformation, Polaroid SX-70 print, 1973, Getty Museum | |
| Born | September 14, 1936 |
| Died | March 7, 2024 (aged 87) New York City, New York, U.S. |
| Nationality | American |
| Education | Rutgers University |
| Known for | Photography, sculpture, printmaking |
Early life and education
editSamaras was born in Kastoria, Greece on September 14, 1936.[2] He studied at Rutgers University on a scholarship, where he met Allan Kaprow and George Segal.
Career
editSamaras participated in Kaprow's "Happenings," and posed for Segal's plaster sculptures.[3] Claes Oldenburg, in whose Happenings he also participated, later referred to Samaras as one of the "New Jersey school," which also included Kaprow, Segal, George Brecht, Robert Whitman, Robert Watts, Geoffrey Hendricks, and Roy Lichtenstein. Samaras previously worked in painting, sculpture, and performance art, before beginning work in photography. He subsequently constructed room environments that contained elements from his own personal history.[4] His "Auto-Interviews" were a series of text works that were "self-investigatory" interviews.[5] The primary subject of his photographic work is his own self-image, generally distorted and mutilated. He worked with multi-media collages, and by manipulating the wet dyes in Polaroid photographic film to create what he calls "Photo-Transformations". Of the diverse nature and output of his body of work New York Times arts journalist Grace Glueck said in 1996 that "There appears to be not one Lucas Samaras, but several artists of that name”.[6]
Samaras was represented by Pace Gallery from 1965.[7] He represented Greece at the 53rd Venice Biennale in 2009 with the multi-installation "PARAXENA" in the Greek Pavilion in the Giardini.[8] Samaras' sculpture Stiff Box 12 has been outside the University of Michigan Museum of Art since 1997.[9] He was the subject of several portraits by Chuck Close, in media including painting, daguerreotype, and tapestry.[10]
Samaras died of complications from a fall in New York City on March 7, 2024, at the age of 87.[11]
References
edit- ^ "Lucas Samaras (American, born Greece, 1936) (Getty Museum)". The J. Paul Getty in Los Angeles. Retrieved 2021-08-09.
- ^ Samaras, Lucas, 1936
- ^ Stiles, p. 290.
- ^ Id.
- ^ See Stiles, p. 349, for "Another Autointerview," 1971.
- ^ "Lucas Samaras, Artist Whose Unclassifiable Works Evoked Strange Psychologies, Dies at 87". 7 March 2024.
- ^ LUCAS SAMARAS: Filthy Artist, Not a Prince. 032c, December 1, 2009.
- ^ "Lucas Samaras at the 53rd International Art Exhibition la Biennale di Venezia / E-flux". Archived from the original on 2009-05-31. Retrieved 2009-06-04.
- ^ "Exchange: Stiff Box 12". exchange.umma.umich.edu. Retrieved 2020-09-25.
- ^ "Archived copy" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 2011-09-27. Retrieved 2011-04-27.
{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link) Stone, Nick. Chuck Close: Lucas (press release). Retrieved 4-27-2011. - ^ Kennedy, Randy (2024-03-07). "Lucas Samaras, Artist Who Was His Own Canvas, Dies at 87". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2024-03-07.
General references
edit- Kristine Stiles and Peter Selz, editors. Theories and Documents of Contemporary Art: A Sourcebook of Artists' Writings. University of California Press, 1996.
- Jo Applin, '"Materialized Secrets": Samaras, Hesse and the Small Scale Box', Object, no. 4, 2002
Further reading
edit- Goysdotter, Moa (2013). Impure Vision: American Staged Art Photography of the 1970s. Lund: Nordic Academic Press. ISBN 9789187351006.