Many good, famous or at least successful artists are also known to be great, sometimes almost obsessive, readers of daily newspapers. On the part of such a daily newspaper, of course, the conclusion is obvious that the two could have a causal relationship. That regular participation in current events can at least do no harm before you start your own work in the ivory tower of the studio. And sometimes what is created there is in turn an artistic appreciation of reading the newspaper.
The Canadian Rodney Graham certainly brought into the world the best, most famous and at the same time most amusing newspaper readers in recent art history. There was the “Newspaper Man”: the photo of a gentleman in a suit holding a newspaper in front of his face, apparently reading it. Only at second glance do you see the two peepholes through which he is actually looking at the viewer like a spy, which of course immediately brings to mind the legend according to which George Grosz, when he was still an art student at the Dresden Academy, used such peepholes in the café on the Altmarkt peepholes in his daily newspaper, flicked small sugar cubes at those sitting around and then watched from cover what was happening. Maintaining a certain anarchistic childishness is often considered an essential entry requirement for this profession – in addition to curiosity and powers of observation. “Avid Reader,” another famous Graham picture, shows an old man assiduously studying the newspapers that were taped over a store’s window during renovations. Graham had actually seen this scene once on Vancouver’s Main Street, where the local café was located, where he himself presumably read the “Vancouver Sun” or the rival newspaper “The Province” (probably both).
Because Graham was an artist in great demand internationally, represented by major galleries in New York, London, Zurich, Berlin, exhibited in museums and at biennials around the world; but at the same time he was and definitely remained a man from Vancouver on the west coast of Canada – a little out of the way maybe, but with his own scene and tradition. And last but not least, he also referred to them in his newspaper work: Elaborate photo stagings, presented as lightboxes – that was on the one hand a homage to Jeff Wall, the friend and teacher, on the other hand it was also a parody and a declaration of war; Graham has brought a touch of comedy to Vancouver’s lightbox photo art that one might not think of the Saint Jeff Wall.
Before he took the risk of becoming popular, he had impressed with intricacies
In this approach, he was closer to his southern colleagues, such as John Baldessari, who played his merry games in Los Angeles. Similar to many Californians, however, Graham also has a rather ironic, distanced view of the art scene on the East Coast, which is perceived as somewhat self-confident. In “The Gifted Amateur, Nov 10th, 1962” he shows himself to be a carefree West Coaster who, just returned from a visit to New York, is recreating Morris Louis’s once celebrated color pouring pictures in the bungalow living room with a cheerful “I can do that too” gesture . The really decisive thing here again: the newspapers with which he previously laid the floor are meticulous reconstructions of the news situation of that November 1962.
To get so close to Norman Rockwell’s witticisms was not without artistic scruples. Nevertheless, releasing so much melancholy, quiet pain and silent amazement at oneself in it was an achievement. And Graham not only slipped into an amazing number of different roles as a photo model for his light boxes, he also kept it that way as an artist with his media and methods. Before he decided to explicitly want to be popular and easy (actually the biggest risk an artist can take), he had long encountered an almost intimidatingly well-read and intricate. Long before he embraced painting and paid homage to Picasso late in his career, he had indulged his inner Duchamp. His conceptualism went deep into literature, including Büchner and the film, of course (it’s crazy how beguiling it can look when you let a chandelier spin like a merry-go-round). Not to mention the impressively high-quality country music for a side project that he produces with his Rodney Graham Band has made. Because one would have loved to read in the newspaper what else he would have tackled in the future, it is all the sadder to have to report here that Graham died of cancer on Monday at the age of 73.