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Thom Merrick

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Thom Merrick

(Born 1963, works in New York)

Whitney Outhouse of American Art, 1996

Granite from Tossene, cinder blocks

380 x 235 x 210 cm

With support from Stenentreprenader i Hessleholm AB

Thom Merrick’s Whitney Outhouse of American Art is a paraphrase of the original building by Bauhaus architect Marcel Breuer in 1966 that housed the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York until 2014. Many characteristic features of the original are included: the slanting window layout, the recessed lower area, and the grey granite facing, but Merrick’s variation is in the form of an outhouse. Whitney Outhouse of American Art is a playful work that can be seen as a commentary on architecture that lacks consideration of the dimensions of the human body, and of the people who will use the buildings. As Merrick distorts the Whitney Museum by representing it as an outhouse, the work can also be seen as a criticism of the authority of and selection mechanisms used by art institutions.