Death Shrine 2
1972 - 77
This work is part of Los Angeles–based artist Ken Price’s broader series Happy’s Curios. Named for his wife, Happy, the project was partly inspired by curio shops and the Mexican shrines and roadside pottery shops found on both sides of the border. Drawing attention to the hierarchies between fine art and folk art—often made by unnamed artists, artists of color, or those working in craft traditions—Price began to create identical replicas of utilitarian objects, including ceramic cups, dinnerware, and shrine figures, which he planned to sell in a functional store within a museum context. Though the final commercial element was never realized, Price’s project incisively critiqued the ways in which “craft” is transformed, through the hand of a named artist and the sanctifying space of a museum, into “art” and back again.
Wood, ceramic, ribbon, lace, enamel, Masonite, plastic flowers
84 x 55 x 48 in. (213.4 x 139.7 x 121.9 cm)
Gift of Miani Johnson, Willard Gallery, NY
88.15
