“House of Fire is meant to be a pun on America and the inversion of values.”
—James Rosenquist House of Fire exudes the dynamism that characterizes much of Rosenquist’s Pop-leaning compositions, brimming with punchy red tones and compositionally lively subjects. Two objects that could have been found in Rosenquist’s own advertorial billboard paintings of days past – a bag of groceries and a fleet of shiny lipsticks flank a bucket of molten steel – a raw material not typically found in images of advertising, but crucial to the manufacturing of these objects of desire. When looking with a lens of essentiality, these objects of consumerism provide a visual juxtaposition: the necessity of groceries, the luxury of lipstick. However, these typical products are rotated to great effect, the grocery bag tipped upside down to spill out its contents, the lipsticks rendered sideways to propel into the composition like a round of bullets.Each element of House of Fire’s composition represents a shift in America’s economy. As Rosenquist explained, “the bucket coming through the venetian blind, the house window, and the lipstick were supposed to suggest that America once led in coal, steel, and rail, but that’s all gone; now we’re importing everything, including foreign oil. We used to be a house of fire; we were the world leader in manufacturing, in oil, steel, and rails. Now our economy is converted to software. The steel now provides jackets for lipstick and the oil is the lipstick. The grocery store bag tipped upside down is the economy going to hell.”i
Source and Preparatory Sketch for House of Fire, 1981. Magazine clippings and mixed media on paper. 14 x 25 11/16 in. (35.6 x 65.3 cm). Collection of the Estate of James Rosenquist. © James Rosenquist, Inc. / Licensed by Artists Rights Society (ARS), NY. Used by permission. All rights reserved. As it turned out, the world of heavy industry was indeed rapidly diminishing, while the digital world began to grow exponentially. However, on an individual level, Rosenquist remained dedicated to analog production within his artistic practice. “I don’t want the footprint of the computer in my work. I am old fashioned in this way. I like it low-tech!”ii Rosenquist would remain dedicated to the process of creating handmade source collages for his prints and paintings, never opting for digital collages or digital manipulation of his source images. House of Fire, like many of Rosenquist’s prints, exemplifies his conceptual and compositional approach to artmaking, proving that doing things the old-fashioned way can lead to exceptionally innovative and modern forms.
i James Rosenquist, Painting Below Zero: Notes on a Life in Art, 2009, pp. 273-274.
ii James Rosenquist, quoted in Sarah Bancroft, “James Rosenquist and Collag: Esoteric Loci,” in Walter Hopps and Sarah Bancroft, James Rosenquist, Painting As Immersion, 2017, p. 110.
Literature
Constance Glenn 223
243
House of Fire (G. 223)
1989
Monumental pressed paper pulp print in colors, on TGL handmade paper, with lithographic collage, on Rives BFK paper, the full sheet.
S. 54 1/2 x 119 1/2 in. (138.4 x 303.5 cm)
Signed, titled, dated and numbered 38/54 in pencil (there were also 12 artist's proofs), published by Tyler Graphics Ltd., Mount Kisco, New York, framed.
Estimate
$15,000 - 25,000
Sold for $25,400
Works from the James Rosenquist Estate
New York Auction 15 February 2024
