Whether working in photography, sculpture, painting, or video, Gabriel Orozco fashions the unexpected out of familiar materials. One of his most well known works Black Kites (1997), a real human skull adorned with a graphite checkerboard pattern (what Orozco has called a “skull-ture”), explores the notion of time, dealing with the subjects of life, death, and existence. Orozco’s typography on paper series entitled “Obit” (2008) is an examination—often a humorous one—of the language used in the New York Times obituaries, distilling an individual’s entire life into a short, idiosyncratic phrase. Orozco’s photographic works include both street photography of surprisingly moving moments as well as staged creations; and the artist’s installations can be reminders of the subtle beauty of typically-ignored objects, such as in his 1993 Home Run, installed at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, where Orozco placed oranges in the windows of adjacent apartment buildings.
Whether working in photography, sculpture, painting, or video, Gabriel Orozco fashions the unexpected out of familiar materials. One of his most well known works Black Kites (1997), a real human skull adorned with a graphite checkerboard pattern (what Orozco has called a “skull-ture”), explores the notion of time, dealing with the subjects of life, death, and existence. Orozco’s typography on paper series entitled “Obit” (2008) is an examination—often a humorous one—of the language used in the New York Times obituaries, distilling an individual’s entire life into a short, idiosyncratic phrase. Orozco’s photographic works include both street photography of surprisingly moving moments as well as staged creations; and the artist’s installations can be reminders of the subtle beauty of typically-ignored objects, such as in his 1993 Home Run, installed at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, where Orozco placed oranges in the windows of adjacent apartment buildings.
