Fear and Denial
Brooklyn Museum photograph
Object Label
The proportions of this piece by the prominent installation artist Pepón Osorio are rather ambiguous: the two giant stuffed cats seem to be too large for the narrow table on which they sit. This incongruity reflects the artist’s recollections of visiting his mother’s apartment, filled with knickknacks and figurines, when he was an art student. The objects were in sharp contrast with the aesthetic values of the art world he was entering, and his conflicting feelings of repulsion and attraction assumed giant dimensions in his mind.
Caption
Pepón Osorio Puerto Rican, born 1955. Fear and Denial, 1997. Mixed media, 92 x 96 x 32 in. (233.7 x 243.8 x 81.3 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Bequest of William K. Jacobs, Jr., by exchange, 2003.5. © artist or artist's estate (Photo: Brooklyn Museum, CUR.2003.5_installation.jpg)
Gallery
Not on view
Collection
Gallery
Not on view
Collection
Artist
Title
Fear and Denial
Date
1997
Medium
Mixed media
Classification
Dimensions
92 x 96 x 32 in. (233.7 x 243.8 x 81.3 cm)
Credit Line
Bequest of William K. Jacobs, Jr., by exchange
Accession Number
2003.5
Rights
© artist or artist's estate
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Frequent Art Questions
What is the connection between large orange cats and the words "fear" and "denial" on pendants hanging from a gold chain that is connected?
In the work of Pepon Osorio, the cats comes from the domestic aesthetic of his mother's house, as she would have kitsch objects like these stuffed cats as decoration. And the words "fear" and "denial" play as visual metaphors for the power of that which is not acknowledged. Feelings that often are present in households, or even in the Latino community of New York, but are often never addressed.Why did the artist use cat figurines in this work?
The artist explains that these figures remind him of the sort of kitschy knick-knacks he would see around his mother's house when he would leave art school to visit.For him, these figurines were the opposite of the "high art" that he was studying in school. So, he created a "high art" version of the tchotchkes.
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