Colorful graphic says Félix González-Torres
“Above all else, it is about leaving a mark that I existed: I was here. I was hungry. I was defeated. I was happy. I was sad. I was in love. I was afraid. I was hopeful. I had an idea and I had a good purpose and that's why I made works of art."
– Félix González-Torres
Though he lived and worked as an outspoken, openly gay, Cuban-born man, conceptual artist Félix González-Torres never wanted any singular aspect of his life to box him in or define his craft. He didn’t care for being labeled a “gay artist” or “Latino artist,” despite the fact that much of his work incorporated themes and imagery from these identities. Through his art, González-Torres addressed—albeit abstractly—a variety of urgent political and social issues, particularly when it came to matters regarding discriminatory public policies, censorship of LGBTQ+ artists, and perhaps most importantly, the global impact of the AIDS epidemic. Though most of his works of art are both visually subtle and minimalistic in design, Félix González-Torres’ creations were always maximalist in concept, managing to pack strong emotional punches through with powerfully resonant messages. González-Torres was one of the most significant artists to emerge in the late 1980s, who despite a shortened career made an extraordinary contribution to the art world, with lasting effects that can still be seen today.
Félix González-Torres was born November 26, 1957, in Guáimaro, Cuba, the third of four children. When he was still a young child, he and his sister Gloria were sent to an orphanage in Madrid, Spain to be raised. After spending some time there, they then settled in Puerto Rico where they lived with one of their uncles. As he got older, González-Torres attended university in Puerto Rico, eventually graduating from Colegio San Jorge in 1976. He then started taking art classes at the University of Puerto Rico, with a particular focus on photography and also got involved in the local art scene.
In 1979, González-Torres moved to New York City in order to pursue a degree in photography at Pratt Institute. During this time period, he participated in the Whitney Museum of American Art’s Independent Study Program twice, once in 1980 and again in 1983, the year he received his BFA degree. He would later credit the Whitney program with introducing him to the theoretical framework that helped shape his early artistic practice. Also in ‘83, González-Torres met a Canadian man named Ross Laycock at Boybar, an influential drag club on St. Marks Place in the city, who became his life partner. At the time, Laylock was an aspiring menswear designer who had moved to New York to attend the Fashion Institute of Technology. But shortly after the two met, Laycock returned to Canada to study English and Biochemistry, while also becoming a local AIDS activist as well as a sommelier. Despite their geographic separation, González-Torres and Laycock continued to date and became “intertwined on a molecular level, like all great love relationships. Inseparable, yet unique,” according to their close friend and artist Carl George. Laycock would have a profound influence on González-Torres and played a significant role in much of González-Torres’ work, who at one point wrote that his art was "first and foremost [...] about Ross."
In 1987, González-Torres received an MFA degree from the International Center of Photography and also became an active member of Group Material, a New York based art collective founded in 1980 by artists Julie Ault, Tim Rollins and Doug Ashford. By the time González-Torres joined, the group was small but influential, known for their cultural activism, institutional critique and collaborative ethos. The collective used exhibitions as a means to call attention to social issues like homelessness, gender inequality and homophobia, and appealed to González-Torres who felt that aesthetics and politics were inextricable, though he himself did not want to be labeled a “political artist.”
During the late 1980s, González-Torres’ art career skyrocketed. He held his third solo show at a gallery in New York and in 1988 was invited to create a solo project for the New Museum. One year later, the Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive asked Group Material to participate in a major exhibition focused on the AIDS epidemic in California. That same year, González-Torres erected a billboard in New York’s Sheridan Square to commemorate the 20th Anniversary of the Stonewall Uprising, a seminal event in the gay rights movement.
Just as his professional life began to blossom, González-Torres’ personal life started to crumble. In 1988, Laycock received a positive AIDS diagnosis, which at that time was still very much a death sentence. González-Torres would go on to take care of a dying Laycock, while his artistic output started focusing on themes of loss, disappearance and absence. He first began producing a series of works called “Stacks” at this time, which were essentially piles of pages printed with text or images laid out on a shelf or the floor. The artist intended the works to be depleted and replaced as gallery goers took sheets home from the pile. By 1990, González-Torres had introduced his now ubiquitous candy sculptures, composed of either piles or carpets of wrapped hard candies that invite viewers to pick up a confection from the pile and consume it, thereby contributing to the sculpture’s gradual diminishment.
In 1991, González-Torres’ partner of eight-years succumbed to his disease, passing away from complications related to the AIDS virus at the age of 32. Regarding Laycock’s death, González-Torres remarked: “I would say that when he was becoming less of a person I was loving him more. Every lesion he got I loved him more. Until the last second, I told him ‘I want to be there until your last breath,’ and I was there to his last breath.” One of González-Torres’ most well-known candy sculptures is called “Untitled (Portrait of Ross in LA),” which begins at a weight equal to Laycock’s healthy body weight and slowly gets lighter as viewers take and consume candies, paralleling Laycock’s own diminishment as AIDS ravaged his body. According to art historian Matthew Isherwood, the piece is also meant to remind viewers of their own complicity in the AIDS epidemic.
The period of time during which Félix dealt with this tragic loss was also one during which he inaugurated some of his most impactful works. In 1991, he started creating a series of pieces incorporating curtains of gilded beads with titles like "Untitled (Chemo)” and "Untitled (Blood),” which have been interpreted as possibly suggesting mystical portals into the afterlife, or perceived as as evocative of the orbs in molecular models in reference to the scientific efforts to find a cure for HIV/AIDS. Similarly, González-Torres also debuted his light string sculptures, which typically consisted of two intertwining cords with arrays of low-wattage light bulbs and have been interpreted as symbolic meditations on mortality and loss. Regarding his light bulb sculptures, González-Torres remarked on his desire to cede authority to institutions when it came to the presentation of his works, something which many artists are typically unwilling to do. As a result, many museums and galleries have struggled with understanding how the works should be shown. González-Torres once commented: “When I send this stuff to museums, they keep faxing us back saying, ‘What do we do with this thing?’ and we keep faxing them back saying, ‘Whatever you want!’ and they just don’t believe it.”
Several other notable works made by González-Torres during this time included “Untitled (Go-Go Dancing Platform),” made of a light bulb lined square box of wood atop of which a live male go-go dancer in a silver speedo and sneakers dances while listening to a Walkman. The piece is incredibly queer and art critic Bob Nickas once described it as “kinky minimalism.” More poignantly, “Untitled (Perfect Lovers),” features two clocks against a white painted wall that are, at first, set in unison. As time goes on, the clocks’ batteries begin to expire at different rates, causing them to eventually fall out of sync, signifying a meditation on the nature of time itself. According to González-Torres, “this piece I made with the two clocks was the scariest thing I have ever done.”
Throughout the early ‘90s, González-Torres received numerous honors and awards and was also part of many notable museum exhibitions around the world, including an impressive retrospective at the Guggenheim in 1995 and a show called "Traveling," which was shown at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles, the Hirshhorn Museum in Washington, D.C. and the Renaissance Society in Chicago. The artist continued to be both innovative and prolific but at the same time was also grappling with his own HIV-positive diagnosis. In 1996, González-Torres would himself finally succumb to the disease, passing away in Miami at the age of 38.
In 2002, The Félix González-Torres Foundation was established to honor and continue the artist’s legacy, working alongside the Andrea Rosen Gallery, which had represented González-Torres since 1990. In 2007, González-Torres became only the second ever artist (after Robert Smithson) to be chosen posthumously to represent the United States at the Venice Biennale. Though his life was cut tragically short, González-Torres’ body of work lives on through the efforts of the Foundation, and his pieces can be seen at museums, galleries and other cultural institutions across the globe. His artistry and vision continue to resonate with and inspire new generations of artists, particularly those inclined towards creating interactive art experiences or minimalist works with powerful messages. Unlike many of his contemporaries at the time, González-Torres never felt the need to employ confrontational tactics in his work for the sake of shock value, and instead he left behind an abundance of subtle creations with powerful metaphors whose messages stand the test of time, even if many of their physical forms intentionally do not. As art curator Amada Cruz once said, González-Torres’ work “is an art of blank spaces and things left unsaid.”
REFERENCES AND FURTHER READING
Disclaimer: some of the sources may contain triggering material
Ault, Julie, ed. Félix González-Torres. Göttingen, Steidl Verlag, 2016.
Bleckner, Ross. “Felix Gonzalez-Torres.” Bomb Magazine, 1995, April 1. https://bombmagazine.org/articles/1995/04/01/felix-gonzalez-torres/
Brown, Ethan. “Félix González-Torres Residence & Studio.” NYC LGBT Historic Sites Project, 2022, August. https://www.nyclgbtsites.org/site/felix-gonzalez-torres-residence-studio/
Fleischmann, T. Time Is the Thing a Body Moves Through. United States, Coffee House Press, 2019.
Greenberger, Alex. “How Felix Gonzalez-Torres’s Unabashedly Political Art Lent Minimalism a New Context.” Art in America, 2021, May 6. https://www.artnews.com/feature/who-was-felix-gonzalez-torres-why-was-he-important-1234592006/
Muñoz, José Esteban. Disidentifications: Queers of Color and the Performance of Politics. Minneapolis, University of Minnesota Press, 1999.
Steer, Emily. “A Guide to the Pioneering Conceptual Artwork of Felix Gonzalez-Torres.” AnOther Magazine, 2023, January 17. https://www.anothermag.com/art-photography/14620/felix-gonzalez-torres-guide-david-zwirner-new-york
Storr, Robert. “Interview with Felix Gonzalez-Torres.” ArtPress, 1995, January. https://creativetime.org/programs/archive/2000/Torres/torres/storr.html
Weaver, Ben. “Perfect Lovers: Felix Gonzalez-Torres.” The London List, 2020. https://www.thelondonlist.com/culture/felix-gonzalez-torres