2012 Catalogue Archive

Jim Lambie’s work possesses a wonderful blend of music, color, fashion, popular culture, and formalism, seen here in Metal Box (Green Onions). Visually, the work has Lambie’s trademark skillful mix of bright, Pop-ish colors. The folded corners of metal cast reflected color onto the adjacent edges, creating a subtle color-blending effect, and the repeated pattern on all corners suggest a kaleidoscopic view. Typical of Lambie’s work, the title is taken from a song – the 1962 blues-soul instrumental hit “Green Onions” by Booker T. and the M.G.s, used in numerous movies, commercials, and video games. Lambie was born in Glasgow, and continues to live and work there. His work has recently been presented in one-person shows at the Goss Michael Foundation, Dallas; the Hara Museum of Contemporary Art, Tokyo; GoMA Gallery of Modern Art, Glasgow; and the Hirshhorn Museum, Washington, D.C. His work is present in numerous museum collections, among them the Museum of Modern Art, New York; the Hirshhorn Museum, Washington D.C.; the Tate Modern, London; and the Dallas Museum of Art. In 2005, the DMA presented his work in a site-specific Concentrations installation titled Thirteenth Floor Elevator (which refers to the 1960s psychedelic band) that included his multicolored tape installation on the floor of the gallery concourse.