VENUS, JULY 6, 1958

Painting

-

di Rosa Center for Contemporary Art

Name/Title

VENUS, JULY 6, 1958

Entry/Object ID

833

Description

Kneeling female nude with head bowed and cloud-like form enveloping her; black and white with a few green brush strokes on torso

Artwork Details

Medium

Oil on Canvas

Category

Painting

Acquisition

Accession

AR0833

Source or Donor

Anglim/Trimble

Acquisition Method

Purchase

Notes

Credit Line: © Conner Family Trust, San Francisco, and Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

Made/Created

Artist

Bruce Conner

Date made

1958

Dimensions

Dimension Description

Object

Height

54 in

Width

42 in

Exhibitions

Exhibition

Totem di Rosa

Notes

Friday, March 3, 2023 - Sunday, July 30, 2023, Napa, CA

Exhibition

The Incorrect Museum: Redux

Notes

May 13, 2022 - February 26, 2023, di Rosa Center for Contemporary Art, Napa

Exhibition

The Rat Bastard Protective Association

Notes

October 1 2016 - January 7, 2017, The Landing, Los Angeles

Exhibition

Renaissance on Fillmore 1955-65

Notes

November 3, 2012 – January 27, 2013, di Rosa Center for Contemporary Art, Napa

Research Notes

Research Type

Curator

Date

2022

Notes

Conner’s Venus became the subject of a widely reported obscenity scandal when, in 1958, it was hung in the window of San Francisco’s Designers’ Gallery. Officer John H. Monson, the Examiner reported, “ordered the picture removed from public view after a housewife complained that neighborhood children must pass the painting on their way to school. ‘It isn’t art,’ he said. ‘It leaves nothing to the imagination.’” Conner, ever-defiant, nevertheless insisted on the work’s reinstallation, informing the paper: “The officer has a dirty mind. And you can quote me.” The incident was ultimately investigated by the SFPD. Conner, like his contemporaries Ginsburg, McClure and Ferlinghetti, courted the politics of obscenity; embracing a frank, metaphysical view of human sexuality that defied the rigid social codes of 1950s America and advocating an absolutist stance on first amendment issues that remains controversial today.