Issue link: https://read.dmtmag.com/i/496780
However, in the past year, I made a piece about Pharrell, and I was really hoping that he would see it and contact me. He Instagrammed that he liked it, but that was it. And that left me feeling a bit empty. Both pieces at MOCAD are portraits of American presidents. Is there a particular correlation between Lincoln and Obama that you are interested in? There are many obvious connections between the two, but there was never a single correlation between them that motivated this project. In fact, I tried not to think about any at all. I grew up in Washington, D.C., where monuments to the legacies of American presidents loom large. So I'm very aware of the impression my environment left on me during those years, and have carried that with me. But, lately I've been more interested in how to create monuments that aren't so obvious or conventional. The Lincoln Monument was inspired by how a single penny in your pocket, however small and overlooked, is still a monument to Lincoln. The larger monument is comprised of all those individual pennies, not unlike how an individual portrait of Obama does not necessarily have the grandiose quality of the complete project. You also have a survey opening at the Brant Foundation. Your previous survey was at the Aspen Art Museum in 2013. What were the different approaches to the show? The show in Greenwich at the Brant Foundation Art Study Center has a lot to do with the Brant family and their love for art, and Peter and Stephanie's passion for collecting and connoisseurship. The kids have grown up around this collecting and this passion, and I've tried to weave the family into the exhibition in a very natural way. I've created heart-shaped canvases that have different patterns and icons (one for each family member) to hang next to their favorite work in the show, similar to how one 'likes' an image on Instagram. It's just one way some of the personality of the family seeps into the exhibition. Additionally, the exhibition will also include a fundraising garage sale of the Brant family's belongings. You've been doing Rob Pruitt's Flea Market in different iterations since 1999. It brings up a lot of questions about kitsch, readymade, what is art and how do you sell art on the Internet. In your own words, how do you view the objects in the flea market? It's a performance and therefore I consider it all one thing, but each sale is a thing unto itself as well. It may or may not be kitsch—I haven't really deconstructed it in my mind that way. For me, it's just myself moving toward a simpler, less cluttered life, and it's important to me to remove one thing from my apartment every day that I had previously been compelled by, and then set it free. Does it surprise you what items sell at what prices, and what items don't? I, along with those at the studio who help me maintain the eBay stores, of course want the store to be a success because it feels good at the end of the year to have a large sum of money to give to a charity. For that reason, we're always trying to figure out what is the best way to describe and promote something so that it reaches its peak price, but I have to say it's difficult to predict what will do well, except that the more 'art-like' something seems, and less utilitarian, the more likely it is to sell for a higher price. What is a touchstone of your career that you, personally, love to re-visit? I really enjoyed the haunted house [Surreal Estate, 2003] that I made with Jonathan Horowitz in the Catskills right after 9/11. It was the perfect blend of public sculpture and art about one's private life, as well as an exercise in design and social interaction. When you are finished with The Obama Paintings after Obama leaves office, will you turn your attention to something new? I'm sure that I will, but I'm not going to tell you! Things have to just develop privately and slowly. If I announce something before it's done, that tends to kill it. I will say there are some more monuments I would like to make. I had a friendship with Malcolm McLaren, and I feel like he deserves a monument in London on Kings Road. 160 CULTURED Pruitt's The Obama Paintings at MOCAD, a series the artist has worked on since Obama took office in 2009.