Art@Site www.artatsite.com Jean Dubuffet Monument With Standing Beast
Artist:

Jean Dubuffet

Title:

Monument With Standing Beast

Year:
1984
Adress:
James R Thompson Center Plaza
Website:
www.publicartinchicago.com:
Jean Dubuffet described this sculpture as a 'drawing that extends into space' and hoped it would reach to the men on the streets. Jean Dubuffet felt a special affection for Chicago, home to one of his three monumental sculpture commissions in this country. Monument with Standing Beast is comprised of four elements that suggest a standing animal, a tree, a portal and an architectural form. The configuration invites viewers to enter the sculpture and echoes the dramatically open plan of the James R. Thompson Center.
Dubuffet coined the term"Art Brut" which translates into Raw Art ... which he defines as art created outside the boundaries of official culture. In his words Art Brut are ...'Those works created from solitude and from pure and authentic creative impulses - where the worries of competition, acclaim and social promotion do not interfere - are, because of these very facts, more precious than the productions of professions'.

www.wikipedia.org:
Monument with Standing Beast is a sculpture by Jean Dubuffet in front of the Helmut Jahn designed James R. Thompson Center in the Loop community area of Chicago, Illinois. Its location is across the street from Chicago City Hall to the South and diagonal across the street from the Daley Center to the southeast. It is a 29-foot (8.8 m) white fiberglass work of art. The piece is a 10-ton or 20,000 pounds (9,100 kg) work. It was unveiled on November 28, 1984.
This is one of Dubuffet's three monumental sculpture commissions in the United States. It has been taken to represent a standing animal, a tree, a portal and an architectural form. The sculpture is based on Dubuffet's 1960 painting series Hourioupe. The sculpture and the series of figural and landscape designs it is a part of reflects his thoughts of earliest monumental commission, for the One Chase Manhattan Plaza.
The sculpture is one of 19 commissioned artworks funded under the State of Illinois Art-in-Architecture Program throughout the building. This was commissioned by the Capital Development Board of Illinois.
The sculpture is affectionately known to many Chicagoans as"Snoopy in a blender".