Christy Rupp

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Christy Rupp (born 1949) is an American artist and activist.[1] She lives and works in New York City and the Hudson Valley in New York. Animal behavior inspires her work. She is one of a group of early eco-artists concerned with urban ecology and human's perceptions of nature.

Early career[]

Rupp attended Colgate University, Rhode Island School of Design (RISD), and the Maryland Institute College of Art.[2] As a resident of lower Manhattan in the late 1970s, Rupp exhibited in early artist-run spaces including Exit Art, 3 Mercer Street Store (a precursor to Fashion Moda,[3] Franklin Furnace, the Kitchen, Artists Space, The Clocktower and PS1 International Studio Program, and ABC No Rio.[4] As a member of Collaborative Projects, she also participated in the illegal occupation of an abandoned city-owned building for the groundbreaking The Real Estate Show and also The Times Square Show. She also participated in the explosion of late-1970s artist generated activity which included Group Material,[5] Artists Call Against US Intervention in Central America,[6] (a nationwide mobilization of writers, artists, activists, artists organizations, and solidarity groups that began in New York in 1983), P.A.D.D.( Political Artists Documentation and Distribution), Artmakers, Ventana ( a collective of artists in Support of the Artists threatened by US aggression in the Contra wars of the 1980s in Central America). Her work appeared in early publications of The Soho News, East Village Eye, Heresies: A Feminist Publication on Art and Politics,[7][8][9] World War 3 Illustrated,[10] and Bomb Magazine.

The first publicly visible work was "The Rat Patrol," which was an outdoor poster project of a life-size rat pasted where garbage accumulated, pointing out the fact the city is a living ecosystem with a delicate balance. Art critic Douglas Crimp reflected on this work by writing, "Surely a photograph of a rat borrowed from Health Department files and mechanically reproduced is not a creation of artistic imagination; it has no claim to universality; it would be unthinkable to see the picture on exhibition in a museum."[11]

Mid-career and recent work[]

In the mid-1980s, Rupp turned her attention to global ecological struggles, such as agribusiness and water contamination. One example being the Watershed Glassware, a set of glasses for drinking tap water, featuring printed images of "perfectly harmless" organisms like Giardia, Cryptosporidium, and Fluoride. She began to make public art works including Social Progress, a commission for the Public Art Fund. Recent works include sculptures of fake ivory and its association with commercial arms trade and oil extraction. In a statement, the artist explains that her work is less about animals than it is concerned with our attitudes towards habitat. Other recent works include the series "Extinct Birds Previously Consumed by Humans (From the Brink of Extinction to the Supermarket)," that was shown at the Museum of Art and Design's exhibition, Dead or Alive.[12]

References[]

  1. ^ "Oral history interview with Christy Rupp, 2012 July 16-17". Archives of American Art. Smithsonian Institution. Retrieved 16 July 2021.
  2. ^ "Christy Rupp". ArtsWA. Washington State Arts Commission. Retrieved 16 July 2021.
  3. ^ "The Mercer Street Store - Art Nerd New York".
  4. ^ http://www.abcnorio.org here-can-we-be-123-delancey-street/),
  5. ^ "GROUP MATERIAL". Archived from the original on 2018-05-03. Retrieved 2016-11-28.
  6. ^ "Artists Call Against US Intervention in Central America". 29 February 2016.
  7. ^ Heresies: A Feminist Publication on Art and Politics, #13, 1981
  8. ^ Heresies: A Feminist Publication on Art and Politics, #20, 1985
  9. ^ Heresies: A Feminist Publication on Art and Politics, #24, 1989
  10. ^ World War 3 Illustrated, The Land Issue, #29, 2000
  11. ^ Crimp, Douglas (Autumn 1984). "The Art of Exhibition*". October. 30: 53. Retrieved 13 November 2020.
  12. ^ Dead or Alive.
  • Times Square Show references: Martinez, Anna Blouin Art Info October 22, 2012
  • Times Square Show- Committee for the Real Estate Show. “History: The Real Estate Show Manifesto or Statement of Intent.” ABC No Rio. N.p., n.d. Web. 18 August 2009.
  • Hunter College http://www.timessquareshowrevisited.com/exhibition.html
  • Deitch, Jeffrey. “Report from Times Square.” Art in America September 1980: 58–63.
  • Ehrlich, Dimitri and Gregor Ehrlich. “Graffiti in Its Own Words.” New York 10 July 2006: n. pag. Web. 4 March 2009.
  • Eliot, Marc. Down 42nd Street: Sex, Money, Culture, and Politics at the Crossroads of the World. New York: Warner Books, 2001.
  • Goldstein, Richard. “The First Radical Art Show of the '80s.” Village Voice 16 June 1980: 1, 31–2.
  • Levin, Kim. “The Times Square Show.” Arts September 1980: 87–90.
  • Lippard, Lucy R. “Sex and Death and Shock and Schlock: A Long Review of ‘The Times Square Show’ by Anne Ominous.” Post-modern Perspectives: Issues in Contemporary Art. Ed. Howard Risatti. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1990. 77-86.
  • Sedgwick, Susana. “Times Square Show.” East Village Eye Summer 1980: 21.
  • Whiting, Cécile. A Taste for Pop: Pop Art, Gender, and Consumer Culture. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997.
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