The Ultimate Cliché in Art History. #RagnarKjartansson #Art21

Why It Matters

By turning a prestigious Biennale pavilion into a lived‑in critique of artistic stereotypes, the work reshapes how institutions present art and sparks dialogue on gender, authenticity, and the value of process over product.

Key Takeaways

• Young Icelandic artist turned Venice pavilion into lived-in studio experiment
• Collaboration involved friend as object while he painted, blurring roles
• He embraces and critiques the white‑male bohemian painter cliché
• Project explored art’s fluidity, decay, and masculinity’s perceived end
• Personal turmoil, including alcoholism, culminated in a celebrated masterpiece

Summary

Ragnar Kjartansson recounts how, at 32, he was invited to represent Iceland at the Venice Biennale and chose to transform the historic palazzo into a functional studio rather than a conventional exhibition.

Instead of mounting paintings on walls, he and a close friend staged a six‑month residency where the friend became a living object and Kjartansson painted, allowing the space and materials to deteriorate organically. The experiment foregrounded role reversal, the blurring of artist and subject, and a deliberate embrace of cliché.

He describes himself as “the ultimate cliché in art history,” a white male oil painter chasing a bohemian myth, using that identity both as satire and criticism. He also reflects on the “end of masculinity” and how the project’s chaotic conditions—alcoholism and hysteria—fed into the final work, which he calls a masterpiece.

The piece challenges conventional pavilion formats, prompting institutions and audiences to reconsider authenticity, process, and the politics of identity in contemporary art. Its self‑reflexive narrative underscores a broader shift toward experiential, critique‑laden installations.

Original Description

“When I got invited to do the Iceland Pavilion in Venice [Bienniale] – I think I was 32 at the time. But, Jesus, how am I gonna put… "This is my art" inside some palazzo by the Grand Canal, you know?”

In this clip from our Season 12 episode, “Realms of the Real,” Ragnar Kjartansson remembers a six-month-long performance during the Venice Biennale where he painted 144 portraits of his friend, Páll Haukur Björnsson, wearing a Speedo.

“We will just be in the situation for half a year, and kind of slowly deteriorate… everything. It's hilarious -- like, I am… kind of the ultimate cliché in art history:

I am a… white male wanting to be an oil-on-canvas painter and, you know, have a Bohemian life where I… [laughs].

Yeah, I think through kind of learning about how to… have fun with that identity, and, uh… and also, like, use it as criticism. There was kind of this wishful feeling of the end of masculinity.

I think a lot of my… kind of my artistic vision, this comes from Fluxus, and this idea of, like, art as a… kind of like a fluid happening.”

Watch Ragnar Kjartansson in “Realms of the Real,” the second episode of Art21’s acclaimed series, “Art in the Twenty-First Century,” for free: https://youtu.be/0yn6jvEUGpM