M. Mouse (with) 1 Ear (equals) Tea Bag Blackboard Version (1965)
1973
These works convey how a single form conjured different possibilities and meanings for the artist. He associated the head of Mickey Mouse with a tea bag but also thought of its reduced geometric shape as an old-fashioned film camera. In the shape of a camera, Mickey Mouse was both the character and its container. He later turned the shape into an exhibition structure called the Mouse Museum in which Oldenburg showed everyday objects he collected and arranged in non-hierarchical order. Visitors entered the mouse and walked past a vitrine that looped along the perimeter like a movie.
Lithograph and two-color silkscreen, hand dusted with chalk on paper
9 x 12 in. (22.9 x 30.5 cm), image and sheet size
Gift of Robert Rauschenberg
76.87.19
Photo: Elizabeth Mann