General Idea
Life & Work by Sarah E. K. Smith
Appropriation Appropriation is central to many of General Idea’ s artworks. The group drew on formats and aesthetics from sources in popular culture and fine art. Through mimicry, General Idea played with viewer’ s expectations, reworking familiar forms— from beauty pageants to works of Pop art— in order to prompt critical reflection.
FILE Megazine is a prominent example of General Idea’ s appropriation of popular culture formats. FILE mimicked the name and visual culture of the widely distributed American photo magazine LIFE. This parody, including the group’ s use of a similar logo, did not go unnoticed by LIFE, which pursued a legal claim against FILE. General Idea also took on media and television, for instance, by enacting a newscast and press conference in Pilot, 1977, and mimicking a news magazine, talk show, and infomercial in Test Tube, 1979. The group also engaged the store format. This can be seen in their earliest shop fronts created at 78 Gerrard Street West in Toronto and in their boutique projects, which included The Boutique from the Miss 1984 General Idea Pavillion, 1980, ¥ en Boutique, 1989, and Boutique Coeurs volants, 1994 / 2001.
LEFT: View of the installation General Idea, Magi © Bullet, 1992, consisting of 5,000 silver helium-filled mylar balloons, each 25 x 65 x 25 cm( inflated), edition of three installations plus one artist’ s proof, Museum of Modern Art, New York, photograph by General Idea. This installation view is from Stux Gallery, New York, 1992( also showing General Idea Magic Carpet, 1992, and Playing Doctor, 1992) RIGHT: Installation view of Andy Warhol, Silver Clouds, 1966( re-fabricated in 1994), helium-filled metalized plastic film( Scotchpak), each 91.4 x 129.5 cm, Andy Warhol Museum, Pittsburgh. Warhol made the work in collaboration with Billy Klüver. This installation view is of the Warhol Museum Series re-fabrication of Silver Clouds at Mostra SESC de Artes, Sao Paulo, Brazil, 2002
The art world itself was also a source of inspiration for the group’ s appropriation. For example, General Idea’ s performance XXX( bleu), 1984, mimicked the actions of a performance by French artist Yves Klein( 1928 – 1962), while also employing his signature colour International Klein Blue. With their work Magi © Bullet, 1992, General Idea appropriated Andy Warhol’ s Silver Clouds, 1966, an installation of silver balloons
1 filled with helium. Magi © Bullet is an installation comprised of General Idea multiples:
silver pill-shaped balloons, likewise inflated with helium.
The group’ s paintings also drew on key works in the history of twentieth-century art. For instance, the painting series Infe © ted Mondrian, 1994, reworked the signature abstract patterns of the Dutch painter Piet Mondrian( 1872 – 1944). General Idea’ s
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