Tony Oursler facts for kids

Tony Oursler (born 1957) is an American artist known for his exciting multimedia and installation art. He creates art using many different things, like video, sculptures, installations, performances, and paintings. Tony Oursler earned a degree in Fine Arts from the California Institute for the Arts in 1979. He lives and works in New York City.

Early Life and Art School

Tony Oursler was born in Manhattan in 1957. He grew up in Nyack, New York, in a family that was well-known. His grandfather, Fulton Oursler, was a writer.

Tony went to California Institute of the Arts (CalArts) for his art studies. There, he met other artists who became famous, like Mike Kelley and Jim Shaw. He also learned from important teachers like John Baldessari and Laurie Anderson. After finishing school in 1979, Oursler moved back to New York in 1981.

Tony Oursler's Artworks

Early Video Art: 1977–1989

Tony Oursler first became known for his unique handmade video tapes. These videos often told stories in a broken-up way. Some famous early works include The Loner (1980) and EVOL (1984).

These videos had special soundtracks, painted backgrounds, stop-motion animation, and cool visual effects. Tony Oursler created all these effects himself! His early video art was shown in many art spaces and museums.

Art Installations: Early Works

Oursler's early installations were like immersive rooms. They were often dark and combined video, sound, and language with colorful sculptures. In these projects, he found ways to show moving images without just using a TV screen. He used reflections in water, mirrors, and glass.

One early installation was Son of Oil (1982), shown at MoMA PS1. It explored feelings of worry about conspiracy theories and the oil industry. Another large installation, L7-L5 (1984), looked at science fiction and stories of alien encounters. It was shown at The Kitchen in New York and the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam.

Video Projections: Starting in 1991

In 1991, Tony Oursler started using small LCD video projectors. He used them in his installation The Watching at documenta 9. This work featured his first "video doll" or dummy. He made soft cloth figures and then projected expressive faces onto them, making them seem alive.

He then made many installations that mixed everyday objects with video projections. For example, Judy (1993) looked at how different personalities might relate to mass media. Get Away II showed a projected figure stuck under a mattress, talking directly to the viewer. These works became very popular and received great reviews.

Some of his signature pieces include "talking lights" like Streetlight (1997). He also made video sculptures of eyes with TV screens reflected in their pupils. Other famous works are his talking heads, like Composite Still Life (1999). An installation called Optics (1999) explored the idea of light and dark in the history of the camera obscura. Oursler believed that architecture and moving images have always been connected through this old technology.

Public Art Projects: 2000–2009

In the early 2000s, Tony Oursler started creating large-scale public art projects. The Public Art Fund and Artangel asked him to create Influence Machine in 2000. This was his first big outdoor project. It explored how communication devices, from the telegraph to computers, were used to try and talk to the dead. Oursler projected images onto smoke, trees, and buildings in Madison Square Park in New York City and Soho Square in London.

He then created several permanent public artworks in places like Barcelona, New Zealand, and Arizona. One of these was "Braincast" at the Seattle Public Library.

Million Colors (2006) was a permanent artwork for the Phoenix Convention Center in Arizona. Oursler learned that people in Arizona say the canyons have over a million colors. He was inspired by stories of UFOs and conspiracy theories in the desert. He wanted to give a voice to the desert landscape. The artwork uses spoken texts by local people and immigrants, creating a collage of stories.

In 2009, he made several video installations for the Frank Sinatra School of the Arts in Astoria, New York.

Tony Oursler:Monsters, Tony Oursler & éditions Take5

Public Art Projects: 2010–2020

In 2013, Tony Oursler created a permanent installation called Klang for the Ekebergparken Sculpture Park. This artwork had three parts: a large video cave, a talking lamppost called Spectral Power, and two tree projections called Cognitive / Dissonance.

In 2014, he showed two large installations in the Netherlands at the same time. These were X ergo Y at the Stedelijk Museum and I/O underflow at the Oude Kerk. I/O underflow was partly inspired by the famous computer scientist Alan Turing.

Tear of the Cloud (2018) was a big outdoor project along the Hudson River in New York. It explored the history of technology and communication in that area. Oursler connected ideas like the invention of Morse code to modern facial recognition and artificial intelligence. He also included references to famous stories like The Headless Horseman. The project used digital projections to bring these ideas to life.

In 2019, Oursler created 6th for the Museum of Old and New Art in Tasmania. This artwork was in the old Beaumaris Zoo, where the last Tasmanian tiger once lived. It used projections, sound, and light to bring the tiger back to life digitally. At the same time, he showed Beyond the Spectrum at the Royal Tasmanian Botanical Gardens. This installation had 30 talking lights placed among rare plants, creating a unique experience for visitors.

Also in 2019, Oursler presented Eclipse at the Fondation Cartier in Paris. This piece focused on environmental themes and the idea of losing "enchanted forests."

电流 (Current) (2019) is an installation that spans the Nanjing Eye Footbridge, a pedestrian bridge over a river.

Collaborations with Other Artists

Tony Oursler has worked with many other artists, musicians, and performers throughout his career.

Poetics Group

While at CalArts, Oursler started a music and performance group called "Poetics" with his friend Mike Kelley. Many other artists joined the group over the years. In 1997–98, Kelley and Oursler recreated their "Poetics Project" experience in an installation. This artwork is now on display at the Pompidou Centre.

David Bowie

Oursler was a longtime friend of the famous musician David Bowie. They worked together on several projects. Oursler created the background videos for David Bowie's 50th birthday concert in 1997. In 2000, they made a short film called Empty, where Bowie's head appeared to float and narrate. Oursler also made the video for Bowie's 2013 song "Where Are We Now?" and an artwork for the "David Bowie Is" exhibit, showing two Bowie heads talking.

Constance DeJong

Oursler became friends with writer and artist Constance DeJong in 1983. They worked together on projects like Joyride (1986) and Relatives (1989), which combined video and performance. DeJong is also featured in The Watching, one of Oursler's first works to project videos onto dolls. She also appears in his film Imponderable (2016).

Joe Gibbons

Oursler has also worked with filmmaker and artist Joe Gibbons. They lived together for a while and created a series of videos called On Our Own in the late 1980s and early 90s.

Tony Conrad

Tony Oursler had a lifelong friendship and creative partnership with artist Tony Conrad, starting in 1980. Oursler introduced Conrad to Mike Kelley, and they all appeared in Conrad's films. Conrad also helped with Oursler's film EVOL. One of their biggest collaborations was The Influence Machine (2000), a public installation for which Conrad composed the music. Conrad also appeared in several of Oursler's projection works. Their final collaboration was TC: the most interesting man alive.

Kim Gordon and Sonic Youth

Oursler met Kim Gordon in the late 1970s. They worked together on Making the Nature Scene, a short film about New York club culture in the 1980s. In 1990, Oursler directed the music video for Sonic Youth's song "Tunic (Song for Karen)." In 2005, Oursler collaborated with Sonic Youth and filmmaker Phil Morrison on a piece called Perfect Partner. Kim Gordon has also appeared in Oursler's works and contributed to the soundtrack for his 2018 installation Tear of the Cloud.

Exhibitions and Collections

Tony Oursler's art has been shown in many important museums and art spaces around the world. These include the Museum of Modern Art, New York, the Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris, the Tate Modern in London, and the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York.

His mid-career survey, "Introjection," traveled to several museums from 1999 to 2001, including the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles. His work was also part of Glasstress at the Venice Biennale in 2011.

His art is part of the permanent collections of many public museums. Some of these include the Carnegie Museum of Art, the Fondation Cartier pour l'Art Contemporain, the Hammer Museum, and the Museum of Modern Art in New York City.

See Also

• Inside the Artist's Studio, Princeton Architectural Press, 2015. (ISBN: 978-1616893040)