Text by Senior Communications Advisor Ellisiv Brattfjord
Bourgeois first broke through as an artist at 71 years old. Despite her advanced age, she was to live almost 30 more years as a recognised artist. In total, she was active as an artist for over 70 years and eventually became an icon in the art world.
Are artists supposed to live that long?
One of the myths surrounding artists is that they live hard and perhaps also die young. Yayoi Kusama and Håkon Bleken are both 94 years old. Carmen Herrera, whose art you can see in The Pillars at the National Museum, lived until she was 106 years old. Edvard Munch was supposedly "surprised" to have lived to 81 himself, despite much illness and a very unhealthy lifestyle throughout much of his life.
Bourgeois shatters the myth of the artist whose candle burns out at a young age. How did she live so long and have, at least from what we can see, a meaningful and creative life more or less the whole way?
Remain playful
After studying painting in the 1930s, Bourgeois eventually switched to experimenting with sculpture. Throughout her artistic career, she worked with everything from drawing, painting and textile art, to marble and bronze sculptures and large installations.
"She liked to experiment. She may have started by creating works in plaster, then in bronze and finally in rubber", says Jerry Gorovoy, Bourgeois' assistant during the last 30 years of her life, in conversation at the National Museum.
"She felt no allegiance to any particular material", he says.
There are probably few other artists who can match her variety of styles and techniques.
"Like many great artists, from Picasso to Hockney, Louise retained the show-and-tell charm of childhood well into her 90s", stated John Cheim, co-owner of the Cheim & Read gallery in New York, in W magazine.
“Once, she invited me down into the lair-like basement of her Manhattan town house. There, in the dark, she slipped into my pants pocket a slender carving of a pair of eyes. I was flattered, surprised, stimulated – and her art will no doubt continue to do the same for many others".
Be social
From the beginning of the 1990s, Bourgeois held salon conversations at her own home. She invited young artists and offered them the possibility to give each other feedback on their artworks in production. For the artists, it was a major honour to be invited to the legendary Sunday salons.
"She was keen to get to know other artists and surrounded herself with younger artists throughout her life", says Senior Curator Andrea Kroksnes, one of the curators of the exhibition "Louise Bourgeois. Imaginary conversations" at the National Museum.
Kroksnes also refers to how Bourgeois was an outspoken feminist in the 1970s and was praised by other feminist artists for her fight for their rights and the right to use explicitly sexual motifs.
In 1979, artists Ana Mendieta and Mary Beth Edelson organised a feminist party in honour of Bourgeois. The invited women were asked to come dressed "as their favourite artist", and several of them chose – with a twinkle in their eye – to come as themselves.
"Louise never hung out with older people. She only hung out with younger people", says Jerry Gorovoy.
Perhaps the continuous stimulation from younger artists helped Bourgeois retain her playful spirit?
Curator Learning for the Bourgeois exhibition at the National Museum, Elin Therese Aarseth, likes a piece of advice Bourgeois gave when she was asked what advice she would give younger artists, as quoted by The Associated Press in 2008:
"Tell your own story, and you will be interesting, Don't get the green disease of envy. Don't be fooled by success and money. Don't let anything come between you and your work".
"I was sort of hooked by Louise when I met her. She was 69–70, but she had the energy, a spark in the eye, of someone much younger. I never felt her as an older person", says Gorovoy.
Let your feelings out
