50. Claes Oldenburg and Coosje van Bruggen, study for a sculpture in the form of a stamp, for Cleveland, Ohio, UNSOLVED [1983]
51. Claes Oldenburg and Coosje van Bruggen, Free Stamp, first version, model, 1985–91
52. Claes Oldenburg and Coosje van Bruggen, Free Stamp on extended lettering, 1985
53. Claes Oldenburg and Coosje van Bruggen, Free Stamp, second version, model, 1985–91
54. Claes Oldenburg and Coosje van Bruggen, notebook page: study of stamp proportions, 1984
55. Claes Oldenburg and Coosje van Bruggen, Free Stamp, 1984
56. Ketchum, Konkel, Barrett, Nickel, and Austin for Lippincott, Inc., plan of Free Stamp base, 1985
57. Chicago Bridge and Iron Company for Lippincott, Inc., plan for handle elevation of Free Stamp, 1985
58. Claes Oldenburg and Coosje van Bruggen, view of Free Stamp with figure for scale, 1987(?)
59. Claes Oldenburg and Coosje van Bruggen, Free Stamp, thrown version, model, 1985–91
60. J. Robert Jennings for Lippincott, Inc., letters, face elevation, 1990
61. Lippincott, Inc., plan and elevation of Free Stamp, 1990
62. Claes Oldenburg and Coosje van Bruggen, Free Stamp
63. Claes Oldenburg, Soft Saxophone, 1990
64. Fauquignon, Friar, 1870s
65. Claes Oldenburg and Coosje van Bruggen, installation of Free Stamp, 1991
66. Claes Oldenburg and Coosje van Bruggen, assemblage of Free Stamp, 1991
67. Claes Oldenburg and Coosje van Bruggen, Free Stamp, rigging placement
68. Claes Oldenburg and Coosje van Bruggen, Free Stamp, placement of lettering
69. Claes Oldenburg and Coosje van Bruggen, Free Stamp
70. Service Employees Union, Local 47, flyer, 1991
71. Jeff Darcy cartoon, “Congress’ Stamp of Approval,” Cleveland Plain Dealer, September 24, 1993
72. Jeff Darcy cartoon, “To Bernie Kosar,” Cleveland Plain Dealer, November 9, 1993
73. Bill Watterson, cartoon, Garfield–Maple Heights Sun, May 1, 1986
Free Stamp (with Cesar Pelli’s Key Bank Building)
PREFACE
Cleveland’s Free Stamp deserves consideration as an unusual project in Claes Oldenburg and Coosje van Bruggen’s successful decades-long collaborations on large-scale, public sculptures. It is the first of their works to include writing. In expansion of size, it is the largest of their public sculptures relative to its prototype. Its genesis was the simplest of their many projects, arrived at with minimal discussion and without complicated explorations of drawings and models. Free Stamp became the most controversial of their projects, and was one of lengthiest in coming to fruition.
Transfer of the sculpture from its original corporate domain to a civic setting opened Free Stamp to public scrutiny, judgment, and controversy. The latter posed the dilemma of artistic freedom in a public space, a dialectic which Coosje van Bruggen elaborated in a public address after completion of the project. This study reconstructs the history of Claes Oldenburg and Coosje van Bruggen’s Free Stamp from its commission and genesis in the artists’ collaboration to its temporary rejection, then reacceptance. A new location required a metamorphosis of the rejected sculpture into a new work of art. The reasons for its relocation are probed, touching on political and cultural issues that amplify the international scope of the commission. Surveys of public sculpture in Cleveland and of Oldenburg and van Bruggen’s outdoor sculptures present a backdrop to the commission, and offer insights on the meaning and content of Free Stamp. Their collaboration is characterized, and special requirements for the fabrication of their large works are considered. Creativity as a cognitive process offers further understanding of the genesis of the sculpture.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I am indebted to many people who agreed to interviews and offered archival information in recreating the background for the sculpture commission. Hunter Morrison, director, City Planning Commission, was generous with his time and gracious in giving access to correspondence and relevant documents. Similarly, Jay Westbrook, president of Cleveland’s City Council, was open for discussions and sharing of documents, such as minutes of meetings of City Council, and was a driving force in guiding appropriate legislation for acceptance by the City of the sculpture gift. I thank Martin Hauserman, archivist for Cleveland City Council, for his patient responses to my queries. I am grateful to Jane Tesso, art administration consultant of the BP America Corporate Collection, for access to information about the importance of art for Sohio and BP as reflected in in-house communications, and for background on her involvement with the eventual installation of Free Stamp. Legal files from BP have since been deposited in the archives of the Cleveland Historical Society. I am also thankful to Nick T. Giorgianni, director of property services for Sohio and BP America, for clarifying in-house attempts at BP to rescue the commission.
Leslie Cade and Peter Buettner provided access to memos and clipping files in the archive of the Cleveland Museum of Art. I am indebted to Betsy Lantz, head of the Ingalls Library, and her capable staff at the Cleveland Museum of Art for research support. Early drafts of the text were read by Carol Nathanson, Gabriel P. Weisberg, Holly Witchey, and John Garton, whose useful suggestions were greatly appreciated, as were those of an anonymous reader for Ohio University Press. I am indebted to the editorial and design staffs of the Press for the care and effort devoted to my text: Nancy Basmajian, Ricky Huard, and Beth Pratt.
Quotations of the sculptors in this text which are not cited are taken from the proceedings of the symposium “Spirit of the Monument,” April 11, 1992, Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, Ohio. An audio record on VHS tape is preserved in the Archives of American Art and in the Sculpture Center, Cleveland, Ohio. I would like to acknowledge Suzanne Ferguson, dean of Humanities, Arts, and Social Sciences at Case Western Reserve University, for recognizing both the significance of Free Stamp for the city of Cleveland and the importance of the symposium on the sculpture of Claes Oldenburg and Coosje van Bruggen, from which this text originated. Her full support of the program is greatly appreciated. I am also indebted to Coosje van Bruggen and Claes Oldenburg for several conversations about the project, and to Carey Ascenzo and Alexandra Lane of the Oldenburg van Bruggen Studio for assistance of every kind, but mostly technical, and for graciously providing images of sculptures and permissions to publish them in illustration of the text. In May 2014, Case Western Reserve University presented Mr. Oldenburg with an honorary degree, and the Intermuseum Conservation Association (ICA) began a conservation campaign to restore surface abrasion and interior metal oxidation; the procedures are recorded in a video documentary available from the ICA. Ann Albano, director of the Sculpture Center, initiated final arrangements for the conservation of Free Stamp with BP offices in Houston, Texas. I am indebted to Albert Albano and Mark Erdman of the ICA for background on the project.
Aspects of this study were presented in the following venues: “Oldenburg / van Bruggen