Allen Ruppersberg

Allen Ruppersberg Untitled, 2024
Close InfoInfoReturnAllen Ruppersberg Untitled, 2024
Collage
Framed: 102 x 83 x 2 cmPhoto: Roberto Ruiz
Allen Ruppersberg 25 Ways To Start Over #20, 2022
Close InfoInfoReturnAllen Ruppersberg 25 Ways To Start Over #20, 2022
Chromogenic print
101,5 x 152,5 cm. Framed: 103,5 x 154,5 x 4,5 cm
Allen Ruppersberg Study for Bookmark (Peter Alan Gloo), 1994
Close InfoInfoReturnAllen Ruppersberg Study for Bookmark (Peter Alan Gloo), 1994
Graphite and ink on paper
58,5 cm x 73,5 cm. Framed: 62,8 x 78 x 2,8 cmPhoto: Roberto Ruiz
Allen Ruppersberg Study for Bookmark (Gregory Broyles), 1994
Close InfoInfoReturnAllen Ruppersberg Study for Bookmark (Gregory Broyles), 1994
Graphite and ink on paper
58,5 cm x 73,5 cm. Framed: 62,8 x 78 x 2,8 cmPhoto: Roberto Ruiz
Allen Ruppersberg Study for Bookmark (Paul Barritt Humes), 1994
Close InfoInfoReturnAllen Ruppersberg Study for Bookmark (Paul Barritt Humes), 1994
Graphite and ink on paper
73,5 x 58,5 cm. Framed: 78 x 62,8 x 2,8 cm
Allen Ruppersberg Study for Bookmark (David Powers), 1994
Close InfoInfoReturnAllen Ruppersberg Study for Bookmark (David Powers), 1994
Graphite and ink on paper
58,5 cm x 73,5 cm. Framed: 62,8 x 78 x 2,8 cm
Allen Ruppersberg Untitled, 2017
Close InfoInfoReturnAllen Ruppersberg Untitled, 2017
Pegboard with 52 laminated prints, silkscreened carboard box
Pegboard: 122 x 122,5 x 3 cm. Cardboard box: 24 x 31 x 23 cm
Allen Ruppersberg Untitled, 2017
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28 silkscreen cardboard boxes
Dimensions variable
Allen Ruppersberg Planet Stories, 2019
Close InfoInfoReturnAllen Ruppersberg Planet Stories, 2019
Collages, 17 parts
Framed: 82,5 x 57,5 x 3 cm each
Unique
Installation view: Planet Stories, ProjecteSD, 2019Photo: Roberto Ruiz
Allen Ruppersberg Planet Stories, 2019
Close InfoInfoReturnAllen Ruppersberg Planet Stories, 2019
Detail
Collages, 17 parts
Framed: 82,5 x 57,5 x 3 cm each
Unique
Installation view: Planet Stories, ProjecteSD, 2019Photo: Roberto Ruiz
Allen Ruppersberg Planet Stories #2, 2019
Close InfoInfoReturnAllen Ruppersberg Planet Stories #2, 2019
Detail
Collages, 17 parts
Framed: 82,5 x 57,5 x 3 cm each
UniquePhoto: Roberto Ruiz
Allen Ruppersberg Planet Stories #3, 2019
Close InfoInfoReturnAllen Ruppersberg Planet Stories #3, 2019
Detail
Collages, 17 parts
Framed: 82,5 x 57,5 x 3 cm each
Unique
Photo: Roberto Ruiz
Allen Ruppersberg Planet Stories #8, 2019
Close InfoInfoReturnAllen Ruppersberg Planet Stories #8, 2019
Detail
Collages, 17 parts
Framed: 82,5 x 57,5 x 3 cm each
UniquePhoto: Roberto Ruiz
Allen Ruppersberg Planet Stories #9, 2019
Close InfoInfoReturnAllen Ruppersberg Planet Stories #9, 2019
Detail
Collages, 17 parts
Framed: 82,5 x 57,5 x 3 cm each
UniquePhoto: Roberto Ruiz
Allen Ruppersberg Planet Stories #10, 2019
Close InfoInfoReturnAllen Ruppersberg Planet Stories #10, 2019
Detail
Collages, 17 parts
Framed: 82,5 x 57,5 x 3 cm each
Unique
Allen Ruppersberg Planet Stories #11, 2019
Close InfoInfoReturnAllen Ruppersberg Planet Stories #11, 2019
Detail
Collages, 17 parts
Framed: 82,5 x 57,5 x 3 cm each
UniquePhoto: Roberto Ruiz
Allen Ruppersberg Planet Stories #12, 2019
Close InfoInfoReturnAllen Ruppersberg Planet Stories #12, 2019
Detail
Collages, 17 parts
Framed: 82,5 x 57,5 x 3 cm each
Unique
Photo: Roberto Ruiz
Allen Ruppersberg Science Fiction Stories, 2019
Close InfoInfoReturnAllen Ruppersberg Science Fiction Stories, 2019
5 collages
Each framed: 76,5 x 56,5 x 3 cm
Installation view: Allen Ruppersberg: Intellectual Property 1968–2018, Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, 2018
Close InfoInfoReturnInstallation view: Allen Ruppersberg: Intellectual Property 1968–2018, Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, 2018
Photo: Galen Fletcher
Installation view: Allen Ruppersberg: Intellectual Property 1968–2018, Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, 2018
Close InfoInfoReturnInstallation view: Allen Ruppersberg: Intellectual Property 1968–2018, Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, 2018
Central work: Portrait of my parents, 1972
Acrylic on canvas, 183 x 183 cmPhoto: Galen Fletcher
Installation view: Allen Ruppersberg: Intellectual Property 1968–2018, Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, 2019
Close InfoInfoReturnInstallation view: Allen Ruppersberg: Intellectual Property 1968–2018, Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, 2019
Central work: Greetings from California, 1972
Acrylic on canvas, 167,3 x 167,6 cmPhoto: Jeff McLane
Installation view: Allen Ruppersberg: Intellectual Property 1968–2018, Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, 2018
Close InfoInfoReturnInstallation view: Allen Ruppersberg: Intellectual Property 1968–2018, Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, 2018
Photo: Galen Fletcher
Installation view: Allen Ruppersberg: Intellectual Property 1968–2018, Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, 2018
Close InfoInfoReturnInstallation view: Allen Ruppersberg: Intellectual Property 1968–2018, Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, 2018
Photo: Galen Fletcher
Installation view: Allen Ruppersberg: Intellectual Property 1968–2018, Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, 2018
Close InfoInfoReturnInstallation view: Allen Ruppersberg: Intellectual Property 1968–2018, Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, 2018
Photo: Adrienne Fox
Allen Ruppersberg Where’s Al? Part II – The Sequel, 1997
Close InfoInfoReturnAllen Ruppersberg Where’s Al? Part II – The Sequel, 1997
DetailPhoto: Roberto Ruiz
Allen Ruppersberg Where’s Al? Part II – The Sequel, 1997
Close InfoInfoReturnAllen Ruppersberg Where’s Al? Part II – The Sequel, 1997
DetailPhoto: Francesc Daniel
Allen Ruppersberg Where’s Al? Part II – The Sequel, 1997
Close InfoInfoReturnAllen Ruppersberg Where’s Al? Part II – The Sequel, 1997
DetailPhoto: Frances Daniel
Allen Ruppersberg The Rise of L.A., 2012
Close InfoInfoReturnAllen Ruppersberg The Rise of L.A., 2012
3 record - multiples on wooden shelf, DVD video on monitor
Each record - multiple: 21 x 31,5 cm
Ed. 3
Photo: Roberto Ruiz
Allen Ruppersberg The Rise of L.A., 2012
Close InfoInfoReturnAllen Ruppersberg The Rise of L.A., 2012
DetailPhoto: Roberto Ruiz
Allen Ruppersberg The Rise of L.A., 2012
Close InfoInfoReturnAllen Ruppersberg The Rise of L.A., 2012
DetailPhoto: Roberto Ruiz
Allen Ruppersberg The Rise of L.A., 2012
Close InfoInfoReturnAllen Ruppersberg The Rise of L.A., 2012
DetailPhoto: Roberto Ruiz
Allen Ruppersberg The Rise of L.A., 2012
Close InfoInfoReturnAllen Ruppersberg The Rise of L.A., 2012
DetailPhoto: Roberto Ruiz
Allen Ruppersberg The Rise of L.A., 2012
Close InfoInfoReturnAllen Ruppersberg The Rise of L.A., 2012
DetailPhoto: Roberto Ruiz
Allen Ruppersberg The New Five Foot Shelf, 2001
Close InfoInfoReturnAllen Ruppersberg The New Five Foot Shelf, 2001
44 photo posters, 50 books, table
Installation view, Allen Ruppersberg: Intellectual Property 1968–2018, Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, 2019Photo: Jeff McLane
Allen Ruppersberg The Meditation, 1977
Close InfoInfoReturnAllen Ruppersberg The Meditation, 1977
Graphite on paper, 5 panels, each 68,6 x 155 cm
Installation view: Allen Ruppersberg: Intellectual Property 1968–2018, Walker Art Center, 2018Photo: Galen Fletcher
Allen Ruppersberg The Picture of Dorian Gray, 1974
Close InfoInfoReturnAllen Ruppersberg The Picture of Dorian Gray, 1974
Marker on canvas in 20 parts, each 183 x 183 cm
Installation view: Allen Ruppersberg: Intellectual Property 1968–2018, Walker Art Center, 2018Photo: Galen Fletcher
Allen Ruppersberg Al’s Cafe, 1969
Close InfoInfoReturnAllen Ruppersberg Al’s Cafe, 1969
Documentation from Al's cafe interior. Courtesy of Allen Ruppersberg
Photo: Gary Krueger
Allen Ruppersberg Al’s Cafe – Best in Town poster, 1979
Close InfoInfoReturnAllen Ruppersberg Al’s Cafe – Best in Town poster, 1979
Courtesy of Allen Ruppersberg

Allen Ruppersberg Travel Piece, 1969
Close InfoInfoReturnAllen Ruppersberg Travel Piece, 1969
Newspapers from various cities, card table, tablecloth, folding chair. Dimension variable
Installation view: When Attitudes Become Form: Bern 1969/Venice 2013. Fondazione Prada, Venice, 2013Photo: Attilio Maranzano
Biography
Born in Cleveland, Ohio, USA, 1944. Lives and works in New York and Los Angeles, USA
Ruppersberg graduated from the Chouinard Art Institute in Los Angeles in 1967. He began as a painter but quickly abandoned oil and canvas in favor of projects that were about language, pictures, books, and ideas. His love for images and texts led him to gather thousands of books, postcards, photographs, magazines, slides, posters, and a large collections of industrial and educational films from 1931-1967. For an artist interested in the cultural mythologies, narratives, and common truths of everyday life, this collection of materials, featuring mostly items from American popular culture of the mid 20th century, has frequently served as fertile source material in his work. Together with John Baldessari, Douglas Huebler or Lawrence Weiner Ruppersberg belongs to the first generation of American Conceptual artists that changed the way art was thought about.
Selected Texts
- 2024Diedrich DiederichsenRule and Deviaton
- 2018Leah OllmanArt in America
- 2013Brian BoucherArt in America
- 2011Andrew BerardiniMousse
- 2010Matias ViegenerX-TRA
- 2010Catherine TaftArtforum
- 2008Coline MillardAfterall
- 2007Tim GriffinArtforum
- 2005Steven SternFrieze
Exhibitions
- 27 September — 16 November 2019
“If you live long enough you begin to see
the endings of the things in which you saw the beginnings”
Allen RuppersbergLos Angeles was the city of Allen Ruppersberg’s beginnings in the late 1960’s. He graduated from the Chouinard Art Institute (later Cal Arts) in 1967 and had his first solo exhibition at the legendary Eugenia Butler gallery in 1969. This same year he attracted wide critical attention when he opened Al’s Café. When Harald Szeemann invited him to participate in Live in Your Head: When Attitudes Become Form, and then included him in Documenta 5 three years later, Ruppersberg’s stature as a young conceptual artist was established. All along five decades, Ruppersberg has developed his unique voice in conceptual art. He is an avid collector, a vernacular anthropologist that has spent years amassing an immense trove of postcards, educational films, magazines, posters, comic books, obituaries, newspaper clippings, records, objects and ephemera of all sorts. This archive serves as a regular resource for the artist, who tirelessly draws, copies, classifies, rearranges and recycles elements in the making of his works. As he himself has stated: “The idea of rearranging my life and the work is an ongoing subject.” Language is a key element in Ruppersberg work.
- 03 May — 27 July 2013
- 15 July — 16 September 2026
- 01—28 February 2023
- 30 August — 17 September 2016
News
- 28 June — 18 August 2019
GROUP SHOW: SWISS INSTITUTE, NEW YORK
- 24 May — 7 September 2019
GROUP SHOW: McEVOY FOUNDATION FOR THE ARTS, SAN FRANCISCO
- 17 May — 21 July 2019
GROUP SHOW: KUNSTVEREIN HAMBURG
- 10 February — 12 May 2019
SOLO SHOW: HAMMER MUSEUM, LOS ANGELES
- 17 November 2018 — 27 January 2019
GROUP SHOW, MUSEUM OF CONTEMPORARY ART CHICAGO
- 14 July — 30 September 2018
Group Show, Cleveland Triennial for Contemporary Art