93 Quotes by Claes Oldenburg

The main reason for the colossal objects is the obvious one, to expand and intensify the presence of the vessel – the object.

I don’t do abstract art because I don’t find it as interesting as I do subjects and depictions.

I’m always careful to say that I changed everything I found.

I am an immigrant in a sense. What happened was that my father was stationed in New York when my mother became pregnant, and she said, “I’ve got to go to Sweden so this child can be born there, because you don’t have any idea where you’re going to be transferred next.”

The end of the ’60s was a terrible time. I was in Los Angeles then, and I remember the night someone ran into the studio and told us about the Manson murders. Then suddenly something happened, the ’60s disappeared. The ’70s were completely different.

I started to draw buildings. I called them Proposed Colossal Monuments – they weren’t for real, not for actual building. It was more a critique of architecture.

There’s always been a potential erotic possibility with objects.

I went back to the Art Institute, then spent the summer at the Ox-Bow School in Saugatuck, Michigan. That’s what really awakened me. I made a lot of oil paintings and my first performance.

The thing about the ray gun is, you pick up anything you see on the street that’s the shape of a gun.