Video: Rosenquist at Green Gallery

First broadcast on CBS Television’s ‘Eye on New York’ series on 17 March 1964, these edited clips were drawn from Art for Whose Sake?, a documentary produced and written by Gordon Hyatt. The footage shows Candidate 1963 – before it was repainted by the artist into its present form as Silo 1963–4 (Tate T01829) – in its first public showing at James Rosenquist’s solo exhibition at Green Gallery, New York, which was directed at the time by Richard Bellamy. The clips show the attendees including artists George Segal, Andy Warhol, Roy Lichtenstein, Allan Kaprow, Ethel and Richard Scull and, of course, Rosenquist himself.

The footage documents the arrangement of works in the exhibition, including AD, Soap Box Tree 1963 (destroyed), Binoculars 1963 (destroyed), Capillary Action II 1963 (National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa), Early in the Morning 1963 (Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, Richmond), He Swallowed the Chain 1963 (Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven), Nomad 1963 (Albright-Knox Art Gallery, New York), 1,2,3, Outside 1963 (Spencer Museum of Art, Lawrence), Untitled (Two Chairs) 1963 (private collection), Untitled 1963 (destroyed, later remade as Tumbleweed 1963–6, private collection) and Candidate 1963 (now Silo).

The exhibition of Silo at Dwan Gallery in Los Angeles later in 1964, which formed part of Rosenquist’s first solo show in the city, appears to not have been photographically documented, but a list of works held in the archives of the gallery give its contents as follows: 3 Peanuts 1964, Orange Field 1964 (private collection), Silo 1963–4, Untitled (Joan Crawford Says…) 1964 (Museum Ludwig, Cologne), Wrap II 1964 (Museum Ulm, Ulm), Conveyer Belt 1964 (private collection), Fruit Salad 1964 (private collection), Discs 1964 (Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen, Rotterdam), Dishes 1964 (Seattle Art Museum, Seattle), Director 1964 (private collection) and Silhouette 1964 (private collection). Silo was the largest and, priced at $9000, the most expensive work on display.