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Artworks

Edward & Nancy Kienholz, The Wholly Holly Terror, 1986, Idaho

Edward & Nancy Kienholz

The Wholly Holly Terror, 1986, Idaho
Mixed media
97.5 x 39.5 x 23.7 cm
38 3/8 x 15 1/2 x 9 3/8 inches
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A toy gorilla, which the Keinholzs found in a junk store in Mexico, becomes a figure of God as a vengeful and frightening deity in the wall mounted assemblage, The...
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A toy gorilla, which the Keinholzs found in a junk store in Mexico, becomes a figure of God as a vengeful and frightening deity in the wall mounted assemblage, The Wholly Holy Terror. He stands atop an icon of Jesus on the cross, in a box fastened to a cloth-covered, wall mounted panel. One deer antler juts out from the right side of that box. This work is an attack on Christianity and, more generally, all religions. Kienholz, raised by a devout Protestant mother, is a confirmed atheist. Promoting the notion of a vindictive God is, in his and Reddin Keinholz’s view, simply another way for clergymen to perpetuate the illusion that a supreme being does indeed exist. Our conduct on Earth must meet with his approval, the augment goes, or we will be punished after death. As God is pictured in this assemblage, He is an absurd rather than a sublime figure: a kitsch likeness of the largest primate, akin to King Kong more than a supreme deity.

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Provenance

L.A. Louver, Venice, California

Private collection, Sweden

Exhibitions

Dusseldorf, Germany, Kunsthalle, KIENHOLZ:1980’s. Curated by Jurgen Harten, 23 March – 28 May 1989

Wien, Museum Moderner Kunst, Museum des 20 Jarhunderts, 29 September -12 November 1989

London, The Mayor Gallery, Not Bronze, 1 February - 30 March 2023

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