Christo and Jeanne-Claude

Christo (born Hristo Yavashev, Bulgarian: Христо Явашев) and Jeanne-Claude are an artistic duo known best for wrapping objects and buildings, as well as other types of environmental art. Married since November 28, 1962, they are arguably the best-known practitioners of what is called installation art. Some of their works include the wrapping of the Reichstag in Berlin with aluminized polypropylene fabric, and the Pont Neuf in Paris with golden sandstone polyamide fabric, and "Running Fence" (1976) a 24-mile-long ribbon-like installation of fabric across Marin County and Sonoma County, California reaching to the Pacific Ocean. Their most recent project was 2005's The Gates, in New York City's Central Park.

Although their artwork is visually striking and often controversial due to its size and scale, the artists have repeatedly denied that their projects contain any deeper meaning. The purpose of their art, they contend, is to simply make the world a "more beautiful place" or offer a new way of looking at an old landscape. David Bourdon has called Christo's wrappings a "revelation through concealing."

The couple maintain a partnership in all undertakings; however, Jeanne-Claude has been understood to serve as the PR agent, while Christo has appeared to make the creative decisions. She has described their public personae as having a "good cop / bad cop" dynamic.

Early life and works

Christo

Christo Javacheff (born Hristo Yavashev, Bulgarian Христо Явашев), better known simply as Christo, is the primary artist and designer of the duo's projects. He was born June 13, 1935 in Gabrovo, Bulgaria. Although, Christo's talent for art was discovered early by artists from the Academy who visited his family.

He had a weakness for theatre and staged Shakespeare plays in his youth based on sex. In 1953 he was admitted to the Academy of Fine Arts, but was disappointed by the strict socialist curriculum imposed by the ruling Communist Party (in power since the Red Army invasion of 1944).

In 1957, Christo defected from Bulgaria, settling in Vienna. After a semester at the Viennese Academy of Fine Arts, he traveled to Geneva, then moved to Paris. Due to his flight he lost his citizenship, becoming stateless. To survive, in Paris, Christo earned money by portrait painting (which he likened to prostitution). Visiting the city's museums and galleries, he was inspired by the work of Joan Miro, Nicholas de Stael, Jackson Pollack, Jean Tinguely and especially Jean Dubuffet.

In January 1958 he made his first piece of wrapping art: He wrapped an empty paint-tin with acrylic soaked canvas, tied it and colored it with glue, sand and car paint. Christo later said that he didn't know why he did it.

Through the German entrepreneur Dieter Rosenkranz, who bought some of his wrappings, Christo met other artists, among them Yves Klein and the art historian Pierre Restany. His life in Paris was characterized by financial hardship and social isolation, worsened by his difficulties with the French language.

Jeanne-Claude

Jeanne-Claude Denat de Guillebon like her husband is known simply by her first name, Jeanne-Claude. She was born on the same day as Christo, on June 13, 1935 in Casablanca, Morocco. Her 17-year old mother Precilda and her father Major Lein Denat married illegally as Precilda was still a minor. They divorced soon after Jeanne-Claude's birth; her mother remarried three times. During the war, she lived with her father's family, as her mother was fighting with the French Resistance; when Precilda returned after the war in 1945, she found her daughter badly disturbed and undernourished.

In 1946 Precilda was married for a fourth and final time, to the influential General Jacques de Guillebin. The family lived in Paris from 1945 to 1952 and Tunisia from 1952 to 1957, after which they returned to Paris. Jeanne-Claude lived in a privileged community, and though she passed her final school examinations with distinction, she was aimless and dependent on others.

The Couple

Christo met Jeanne-Claude in October 1958, when he was commissioned to paint a portrait of Precilda de Guillebon, but it was with her half-sister Joyce that he first fell in love. Jeanne-Claude meanwhile had become engaged herself, to Philippe Planchon, but before the wedding she became pregnant by Christo; she married anyway but left Planchon after the honeymoon. Their son Cyril was born May 11, 1960. Jeanne-Claude's parents, displeased by the relationship, particularly given Christo's humbler origins, were temporarily estranged from their daughter. The couple finally married in 1962.

In 1959 Christo's wrappings began to change; instead of covering the wrapping material with glue and sand, he left it as was. In 1960 he gave up on painting altogether and finished his Inventory Series. In the autumn, Niki de Saint Phalle and Jean Tinguely visited his studio.

In 1961, Christo covered barrels at the port of Cologne, the first large objects he had wrapped. In 1962, the couple tackled their first monumental project "Rideau de Fer" ("Iron Curtain"). In a comment on the building of the Berlin Wall, they blocked off Rue Visconti, a side-street on the River Seine, with oil barrels, without warning or the consent of the authorities. Jeanne-Claude was able to stall the approaching police and convince them to let the barrels stand for a couple of hours. The Visconti Project made Christo well known in Paris; at the same time he had his first solo gallery exhibition.

In February 1964, Christo and Jeanne-Claude arrived in New York, and after a short time were deported for smuggling Mexicans across the border, and sexually harassing their neighbors eight minors. They were poor and had difficulties with the language, but Christo displayed in some well-respected galleries, including the Castelli Gallery in New York and Gallery Schmela, Düsseldorf, Germany. Christo began to wrap shop-fronts which he had built to scale, whose sale helped the couple pay off debts and financed larger projects. Their next project, a 1,200 cubic meter package, was constructed with the help of enthusiastic students. At the beginning of 1968, they split from the Gallery Castelli in order to remain independent.

Later works

Documenta 4

In 1968, Christo and Jeanne-Claude had the chance to participate at the Documenta 4 in Kassel. For this, the couple wanted to build a package with a volume of 5,600 m³, which would be lifted by cranes and visible from a distance of 25km. However, the first attempts failed from June 24, 1968 as the polyethylene skin frequently burst as it was being raised. After repeated repairs and using the two largest cranes in Europe, the project finally became a reality. The package stood for two months and cost Christo and Jeanne-Claude $70,000 US, which they had great difficulty raising.

Wrapped Coast

At the end of 1969 Jeanne Claude and Christo wrapped a coast in Australia with the aid of 130 helpers who invested a total of 17,000 hours working. 9,300 m² synthetic fabric and 56 km rope were used. After initial resistance from the authorities and the public, after the completion of the project, reactions were largely positive.

Valley Curtain

At the end of 1970 Christo and Jeanne-Claude began the preparations for their "Valley Curtain" project. A cloth 400 meters long was to be stretched across a valley in the Rocky Mountains in Colorado. There were problems obtaining permission for the project due to protests by environmentalists, and with financing the planned budget of around $230,000. Fourteen thousand square meters of cloth had to be hung on a steel cable, fastened with iron bars fixed in concrete on each slope.

Two hundred tons of concrete had to be carried by hand in buckets up each slope. The budget increased to $400,000 and the Christos had once again problems with the financing, but finally sold enough works of art to raise the money. On October 10, 1971 the orange-coloured curtain was ready for hanging, but was torn to shreds by wind and rock. While a second curtain was being manufactured, Christo received a request from a Berlin architect to veil the Reichstag and started work on it. On August 10, 1972 the second attempt to hang the cloth succeeded, but only 28 hours later it had to be taken down because of an approaching storm.

Running Fence

In 1973, after 17 stateless years, Christo became a United States citizen. That same year, he began preparations for "Running Fence": a veiled fence, made from steel posts and steel cables, running through the landscape and leading into the sea. The fence was to be 5.5 meters high and 40 kilometers long. For the project, agricultural workers needed to be convinced and the permission of the authorities had to be obtained, so Christo and Jeanne-Claude hired nine lawyers. At the end of 1974 Christo marked the path of the fence with wooden stakes and on April 29, 1976 the work finally began after a long struggle against bureaucracy. Approximately 200,000 m² of nylon, 2050 steel posts and 145 km of steel cable were needed. On September 10, 1976 the work was completed. However, Christo and Jeanne Claude had to pay a $60,000 (U.S.) fine, because they still lacked permission for the coastal region.

Wrapped Walk Ways

In 1977, Christo and Jeanne Claude were mostly paying back loans and trying to save money. In addition, however, they continued to plan their future projects, like veiling the Reichstag, the Pont Neuf in Paris, as well as "Wrapped Walk Ways", a veiling of footpaths in a park. In November Christo met his parents, seeing his mother for the first time in 20 years.

With "Wrapped Walk Ways" Christo and Jeanne-Claude veiled 4.5 km of footpaths in a park in Kansas City. Altogether it required 12,500 square meters of saffron-yellow coloured shiny nylon fabric. Pedestrians enjoyed the artwork for two weeks in October. The cost of this project amounted to $130,000. From 1979 to 1981 the couple were busy with some projects, many of which they were never able to realize, including the Mastaba of Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates, a project where oil barrels were to be stacked to a height of 150 meters...

Surrounded Islands

The Christo's planned a project based on Jeanne-Claude's idea to surround eleven islands in Miami's Biscayne Bay with 603,850 square meters of pink polypropylene. It was completed on May 7, 1983 with the aid of 500 helpers and could be admired for two weeks.

Pont Neuf

On March 14, 1984, Jeanne-Claude became a U.S. citizen; however, she retained dual nationality and kept her French passport. In August the couple received permission to veil the Pont Neuf after nine years of negotiations with the mayor of Paris, Jacques Chirac and preparations for the project began. For the veiling of the oldest bridge in Paris, 40,000 m² of sand-coloured polyamide fabric was needed. The veiling began on August 25, 1985 and was finished on September 22. In the next two weeks over three million people visited the project.

Umbrellas

Christo and Jeanne-Claude prepared for their next project, "Umbrellas". The plan was to have yellow and blue umbrellas set up in California and Japan at the same time.

In December 1990, after much preparation, the first bases for the screens were laid. At the bases 80 cm long anchors were fastened to the ground to withstand tensions of 1,500 kgf (15 kN). In order to preserve the countryside, the bases were transported to the site by helicopter. The final cost of the project totalled $26 million. In September 1991 the screens were brought to their places by 1,880 workers.

By September 7, 1,340 blue screens in Ibaraki and 1,760 yellow screens in California had been set up; the exhibition opened on September 9, 1991. In total three million people came to see the screens, each measuring 6 meters in height and 8.66 meters in diameter. Two people died during the construction and exhibition. A woman was killed when one of the screens hit her because of a gust of wind, and a man building the screens came into contact with a high voltage power line.

The Reichstag

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The Wrapped Reichstag

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After the project "Umbrellas" Christo and Jeanne-Claude concerned themselves with veiling the Reichstag in Berlin. With the support of the parliamentary speaker, Rita Suessmuth (Süßmuth, [1]), the Christos worked to convince the Members of Parliament, going from office to office, writing explanatory letters to each of the 662 delegates and innumerable telephone calls and negotiations. On February 25, 1995 after lengthy discussions the Bundestag allowed the project to go ahead.

Over 100,000 square meters of fireproof polypropylene fabric, covered by an aluminum layer, and 15 km of rope were needed. Veiling began on 17 June, 1995 and was finished on 24 June. The spectacle was seen by five million visitors before the unveiling began on July 7.

Verhüllte Bäume (Wrapped Trees)

After 32 years of preparation, Christo and Jeanne-Claude veiled 178 trees in Berower Park north-east of Basel between November 13 and December 14, 1998. To wrap the trees, the couple used 55,000 square meters of silver-grey shiny polyester material and 23 kilometers of rope. A pattern had to be made for each individual tree and so the natural shape of the branches pushed the material outwards, creating individual shapes in the sky. The construction varied in height from 2 to 25 meters and in width from 1 to nearly 15 meters. As with their other projects, this was financed by the sale of original works. All materials used in this project were recycled when it was taken down.

Wrapped Snoopy House

In 1975, Charles M. Schulz drew an episode of his comic strip Peanuts in which Snoopy's doghouse is wrapped in fabric by Christo. In response, Christo constructed a wrapped doghouse and presented it to the Charles M. Schulz Museum in 2003.

The Gates

Main article: The Gates

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Facing Northeast.

On January 3, 2005, work began on the installation of the couple's most protracted project, The Gates, in Central Park in New York City. They have also referred to it as "The Gates, Central Park, New York, 1979-2005" in reference to the time that passed from their initial proposal until they were able to go ahead with it: only with the permission of the new mayor of New York, Michael R. Bloomberg, were they able to proceed. "The Gates" was open to the public from February 12 until February 27, 2005. A total of 7,503 gates made of saffron-yellow material were placed on paths in Central Park. They were five metres high and had a combined length of 37 km.

The cost of the project was estimated at 21 million dollars which was raised entirely by Christo and Jeanne-Claude selling studies, drawings, collages, works from the 1950s and 1960s as well as original photographs of their other works. They did not accept any sponsorship, nor did the city of New York have to provide any money for the project. Christo and Jeanne-Claude donated all the money raised from the sale of souvenirs such as postcards, t-shirts and posters to "Nurture New York's Nature Inc." To avoid vandalism, around 600 volunteers distributed 1 million 7 cm² pieces of the material used for the project to visitors.

This work had a mixed reception, which is not unusual for their projects.

References

• This article is based on a translation of the corresponding article from the German Wikipedia, accessed on May 3, 2005.

Bibliography

For information about the early work of Christo and Jeanne-Claude see:

Matthias Koddenberg, "Christo and Jeanne-Claude. Realism's Newly Unveiled Face", in: Nouveau Réalisme, Catalog edited by Susanne Neuburger, Museum Moderner Kunst Stiftung Ludwig Wien, Vienna 2005 [ISBN: 3-902490-12-8] (Publisher's edition: Verlag für moderne Kunst Nürnberg [ISBN: 3-938821-08-6])

See also

• Land art
• Site-Specific Art
• The Gates

External links

• Official site
• artfacts.net entry, including exhibition information
• The Gates @ Central Park Community blogging project about Christo's February 2005 NYC art installation.
• Wrapped Snoopy House at the Schulz Museum