A level Art ESA, Art Exam, Variation and similarity, text base artwork

1. Peter Davies
The Hip One Hundred, 1998
Rating his friends, colleagues, and art heroes, Davies pits artists and their works against each other in
his mind, vying them for that coveted Number One spot. Davies’ Hip 100 exposes an art world as
insidious, cliquey, market-oriented as any other entertainment medium. By making this painting on
grand-scale, he’s created a high art monument to the undoing of sacred high art values.
Saachi Gallery

2. 'The Fun One Hundred’ illustrates the Davies’ attempt to
understand art history and contemporary art as he lists well-
known figures from Marcel Duchamp and Pablo Picasso to
more recent names - some his own contemporaries such as
Sarah Lucas and Damien Hirst - and comments on each one
with his take on what makes these artists ‘fun’.
“David Hockney: pool attendant”, references the well-known
series of swimming pool paintings Hockney made whilst
living in California during the 1960s, and “Sol Le Witt:
interior decorator”, refers to the geometric wall drawings the
American artist was best known for.
'The Fun One Hundred ' is a breath of fresh air amongst
highbrow art world opinions that put artists on pedestals as
Davies brings them down to a user-friendly level and talks
about art as if it were just another commodity. We are all
human after all, although as Davies has clarified, some of us
are more ‘fun’ than others.

3. Can you name your own top five or top ten artists?
What would your criteria be? What do your artists have in common?
Give your list a heading. Davies’ lists are titled The ‘fun’, ‘hip’ or ‘hot’ 100.
Combine your list with your neighbour’s, then join another pair etc.
Reorganise the hierarchy each time. Comparing your artists AND your criteria.

4. Artists and

5. John Baldessari.
Baldessari creates minimal text based works that present the absurdity of the art market, art
objects, the role of the artist and so on.

6. Tracey Emin
Emin’s work Everyone I Have Ever Slept With
1963-1995, created in 1995, and also known as
“The Tent” is one of her most iconic works and
ties together multiple tactile and conceptual
elements the artist has worked with in her
oeuvre. With 102 names stitched and quilted
into the work, the names acknowledge sexual
partners and loved ones she shared space or a
bed with, including close family members and
two fetuses from earlier pregnancies. The floor
of the tent reads “With Myself, Always Myself,
Never Forgetting.”

7. Mel Bochner
Bochner’s list-based works function like poetry. Each
composition is uniquely formatted and the staggering of
the chosen text embeds further meaning to the subject
of each list. The artist is a master of text and editing,
which makes the initial visual simplicity and bare bones
of the execution of the works deceiving. His work
Portrait of Eva Hesse (Wrap) demonstrates his deep
understanding of the late Hesse, capturing the essence of
her work in a spiraling list of descriptors.

8. Richard Serra
Serra is an artist who has mastered delivering monumental moments in the experience of his
work. Serra famously said, "Drawing is a verb." In Verblist, he compiled a series of what he called
"actions to relate to oneself, material, place, and process.”

9. Jenny Holzer
American artist Jenny Holzer presents statements that can provoke strong responses. Whether
encountered on city streets or in art galleries, Holzer's work asks us to consider the words and
messages that surround us. Her art takes many forms, including stone benches, projections,
signs, posters, paintings, plaques and textiles. Words are central to her work, whether pasted on
a wall, flickering from an electronic sign, carved in granite or stitched in wool.

10. Task: create a list…
Content Presentation
Hierarchy of skill
Kitchen utensils
Inventions
Significant life events
People from your life, past and
present
Advice
Instructions
Synonyms
Repetitive words
Capital letters or lower case
Hand writing
Colour
Background
Fabric
Collage
Found text
Relief