Christo and Jeanne-Claude

Last night, I went to the Architectural League's Current Work lecture series at The Cooper Union, featuring Christo. Although Christo and Jeanne-Claude are not considered "craft" artists in the traditional sense, they're use of fabric as a dynamic and unexpected canvas makes them an interesting addition to this collection. It is obvious that Christo and Jeanne-Claude worked very hard to stay away from the typical artist persona and to pave a new road for the art world. He very strongly reminded the audience that they pay for everything involved in the creation of their very large scale works from the sales of their conceptual drawings and collages that he does with his own hands. Of course, Christo was on his toes and he had some amazing responses to the varied questions in the audience. 

Someone in the audience asked a fairly lengthy question about how the digital world, ie Social Media, has changed his process of working. Christo responded in a not-so-direct, but appropriate manner. To paraphrase: 

Artists, in general, do illustrative works. When you walk into a museum, the paintings on the wall are representations, illustrations. Christo and Jeanne-Claude's work is presented in two different manners. There are the representations, which exist as the conceptual sketches, when they are trying to convince people to let them do the work, and even the photographs of the projects. Then, there is the real thing, like the physical Wrapped Reichstadt (not the photographs or sketches). The illustrations and representations are not real, therefore most artists never do real things. But Christo and Jeanne-Claude do both, but there is a radical difference between the representation and the real thing. The real thing is temporary, it only lasts for a few days or weeks, but the representations are permanent.

Despite Christo's dismissal of the digital world, their works always trope on issues in contemporary society, in a delicate way. Yes, they are very large scale, therefore unavoidable, but the use of fabric softens their approach. Each work is serving as a subliminal call to action, for the environment, politics, economics, and more.

In a current society of immediacy, Christo and Jeanne-Claude represent patience. Most of their projects took decades to complete, but are timeless in nature, so despite the fact that such a long time passed from inception to delivery, they're works are always relevant, whether the representation or the real.