The Accidental Possibilities of the City

"Smith's book brings together a broad variety of interesting artworks, some of them hardly known, by one of the most important artists of the last fifty years. Her deep research reveals the connections between Oldenburg's art and the fascinating postwar decades that thoroughly changed American urban life."--Joshua Shannon, author of The Disappearance of Objects: New York Art and the Rise of the Postmodern City "Smith persuasively argues that Oldenburg's ebullient interventions in public space result from a unique perspective on the ordinary, pedestrian life of the street. The more I think about this book, the more I am convinced that Oldenburg--an immigrant and an erstwhile Midwesterner--is the quintessentially American sculptor."--Miguel de Baca, author of Memory Work: Anne Truitt and Sculpture "A thoughtful and illuminating account of the city as both the material and the subject of Claes Oldenburg's art. Smith builds on substantive archival and historical research to uncover hitherto unexplored aspects of the artist's project, presenting Oldenburg as an artist whose work is inextricably connected to the spaces, personages, and tensions of postwar urban experience."--Michael Lobel, Professor of Art History, Hunter College and the Graduate Center, CUNY