Museum Home Past Exhibitions Jim Dine: Poet Singing (The Flowering Sheets)

October 30, 2008–February 9, 2009 at the Getty Villa

ExhibitionEvents
Poet Singing (The Flowering Sheets) / Dine
Poet Singing (The Flowering Sheets) (detail), Jim Dine, 2008
 
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The first contemporary art project at the Getty Villa, this installation presents new sculpture and poetry by Jim Dine inspired by ancient objects in the Museum's collection.

Two ancient Greek statuettes of dancing women, Statuette of a Dancer and Statuette of a Dancer Playing the Lyre, are magnified in Dine's four eight-foot-high painted wood female figures. Their arrangement around a seven-foot-high self-portrait head echoes the sculptural group Poet as Orpheus with Two Sirens.

Dine's highly personal vision finds further expression in a poem drawn on the walls, with its Orphic themes of travel, loss, and the possibilities of art.

The installation is accompanied by a 10-minute film charting Dine's creative process. Watch the documentary.

About Jim Dine
Since emerging in the early 1960s as part of the Pop Art movement, Jim Dine (born 1935) has become one of the most distinctive voices in contemporary American art. While best known for his expressive depictions of the heart symbol and commonplace modern objects such as tools and a man's bathrobe, Dine has always had a deep fascination with Greek and Roman antiquities. In media as diverse as drawing, sculpture, printmaking, and painting, he has reached across the centuries to engage classical artists, re-creating their work and making it his own.

Installation Views
The installation occupies a 27-by-21-foot space on Floor 2 of the J. Paul Getty Museum at the Getty Villa.

Poet Singing (The Flowering Sheets) / Dine Poet Singing (The Flowering Sheets) / Dine

Poet Singing (The Flowering Sheets) / Dine Poet Singing (The Flowering Sheets) / Dine