George Segal, a pop art icon of the 1960s

Written by: Mats

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(last updated September 26, 2011)

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In 1960, George Segal discovered the bands of plaster for medical use newly manufactured by Johnson & Johnson, allowing him to create a sculpture from a modeling on a live model.

His first experience in itself with the help of his wife Helen who covers his entire body in bandages. This gives a self-portrait he assembles with a table and chair, Man sitting at the table, 1961.
Segal was blown away by the plastic qualities of this new material with a capacity to freeze an attitude almost instantly.

In 1962, during his first exhibition at the Janis Gallery, the works of Segal are closer to Pop Art for their subjects on the daily lives of Americans. Yet the sculptor likes to archetypal condition of the ordinary, against the Pop artists whose images, drawn from the photographs, offer a much more cynical of American society.

From 1962 he stopped painting altogether to concentrate on achieving environments composed of plaster sculptures staged with found objects.

Between 1970 and 1993, Segal environments are more sophisticated. Using a new plaster dries more quickly, hydrostone allows him to get a better finishing details castings. Segal innovates by introducing occasional filmed images and music in his works. But these attempts proved unsatisfactory for the artist limited in its projects by audiovisual means of the time.

In 1976 he took up the theme of the restaurant already used in the restaurant window III (1971) and adapts it for a public order: The Restaurant, Federal Office Building in Buffalo, NY. Segal’s work then specialized public space in the form of commemorative sculptures related to contemporary history:

In Memory of May 4, 1970: Abraham and Isaac (1979), Princeton University; Gay Liberation (1980) New York: The Holocaust (1984), San Francisco Depression Bread Line (1993), Washington.

Segal celebrates routine daily moments as extraordinary cultural expressions: at Joslyn Art Museum, “Times Square at Night” is his tribute to urban life.

In 1993, George Segal returned to painting after thirty years of interruption. It focuses on making portraits.
He died June 9, 2000 in South Brunswick at the age of 76 years.