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Robert Longo Abstract Prints

American, b. 1953

The drawings by artist Robert Longo are a sensory experience: They are monumental, detailed and hard-hitting in their subject matter, which often includes critiques of power, social unrest and consumer capitalism.

Longo has spent his career exploring mediums as varied as the Photorealistic charcoal drawings for which he is best known and film direction. In all of his work, however, he draws inspiration from his deep background in sculpture. “I always think that drawing is a sculptural process. I always feel like I’m carving the image out rather than painting the image. I’m carving it out with erasers and tools like that,” he once said.

The Long Island, New York, native attended high school with a man who was shot at Kent State University while protesting the U.S. invasion of Cambodia during the Vietnam War in 1970, and the famous image of this man lying dead on the ground influenced Longo so deeply that he began to consider all art political. Longo attended Buffalo State College, where he met and became friends with artist Cindy Sherman, and later the two moved to New York City together.

Longo’s revered work includes his charcoal and graphite “Men in the Cities” drawings. The Photorealist series, which debuted at Metro Pictures gallery in Manhattan in 1981, depicted people in formal business clothing. Posing in suspended animation in unusual contortions, the figures take on a choreographic quality and represent the career-minded “yuppies” of the era.

“Men in the Cities” was inspired by punk rock music and decades later has been cited as a visual reference for the opening sequence of the popular television drama Mad Men. The work was among the most recognizable and iconic of the Pictures Generation — the movement by artists who came of age in the 1970s and were disillusioned by the social and political conditions of the time. In 2014, Longo created 12 charcoal drawings for a series titled “Gang of Cosmos,” which were black-and-white depictions of famous Abstract Expressionist works by artists like Jackson Pollock, Willem de Kooning and Lee Krasner.

Through his provocative, detailed and highly precise prints, drawings, photography and sculpture, Longo continues to challenge traditional sources of power and authority.

Find original Robert Longo art on 1stDibs.

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Artist: Robert Longo
Three Strikes You're Out (Limited Edition Triptych)
By Robert Longo
Located in New York, NY
Robert Longo Three Strikes, You're Out (Triptych), 1990 Silkscreen and Color Photograph (C-Print) on Aluminum and Lead Plates 9 4/5 × 23 3/5 inches Edition 120/200 Boldly signed and numbered in black marker from the edition of 200 on the verso; bears the artist's and publishers printed name & copyright Unframed Three Strikes You're Out was created in 1990 by Robert Longo exclusively for the mixed-media box-edition Contemporary Archeology, Pandora Part Three. The works were executed by jennifer Cox for Publishing House Bebert in an edition of 200, numbered and signed copies. This work is assembled as triptych and consists of two aluminium plates. Both aluminium plates show a color photograph of a cloud with silkscreened red X, the lead plate only showing the red X Total size is: 9.8 inches by 23.6 inches Individual Metal Plate Sizes: 9.8 x 9.1 in (2) / 9.8 x 5.1 (1) Unframed Boldly signed and numbered in black marker from the edition of 200 on the verso; bears the artist's printed name and copyright mark, along with the publisher - Publishing House Bebert, Rotterdam. Robert Longo Biography: Robert Longo was born in 1953 in Brooklyn and grew up in Long Island, New York. He graduated high school in 1970, weeks after the Ohio National Guard massacred several students at Kent State University who were protesting the U.S. invasion of Cambodia. One of those killed was a former classmate of Longo’s, and his body was shown in a Pulitzer Prize-winning photograph that was seen across the world. The event shocked Longo, triggering his interest in political activism and media imagery. In 1972, Longo received a grant to study restoration and art history in Florence. While touring the museums of Europe, he realized he wanted to make, rather than restore art. In 1973, Longo enrolled at Buffalo State College, where he worked for artists Paul Sharits and Hollis Frampton, who introduced him to structuralist filmmaking. Along with Charles Clough, Longo also co-founded Hallwalls (1974–ongoing), an alternative non-profit art exhibition space where he organized shows and talks with artists such as John Baldessari, Lynda Benglis, Robert Irwin, Joan Jonas, Bruce Nauman, and Richard Serra. At Buffalo State, Longo started a friendship–that still exists to this day–with Cindy Sherman, and in 1977 the two moved to New York together, where Longo began working as a studio assistant to Vito Acconci and Dennis Oppenheim. That year he was included in the exhibition Pictures at Artist’s Space, curated by Douglas Crimp, which showcased work by a group of five young artists who were engaged with the politics of image-making, drawing from advertisements, newspapers, film, and television. The “Pictures Generation,” as they became known, included artists such as Cindy Sherman, Richard Prince, Louise Lawler, David Salle, and drew from semiotics and poststructuralist theory to investigate the way meaning is made and circulated in modern society. Their work often critiqued the anaesthetizing power of consumer capitalism and the indoctrinating effects of mass media. At his first solo show at Metro Pictures in 1981, Longo presented his charcoal and graphite Men in the Cities drawings, which instantly became icons of the “Pictures Generation,” and some of the most recognizable artworks of the 1980s. Longo performed in New York rock clubs with the band Menthol Wars with Richard Prince, throughout the 1980s. During that period, he also designed numerous album covers, including Glenn Branca’s The Ascension (1981) and The Replacements’ Tim (1985). In 1986, he directed his first music video for New Order’s chart-topping song Bizarre Love Triangle, and the following year directed The One I Love, a video for R.E.M.’s first hit single. Longo began working with diverse materials at increasingly ambitious scales. His Combines series, first exhibited in 1983, incorporated materials such as paint, graphite, wood, plaster, cast bronze, and steel in works that were part-painting, part-sculptural reliefs. Using Sergei Eisenstein...
Category

1990s Contemporary Robert Longo Abstract Prints

Materials

Metal

Jules, Gretchen, Mark (state II)
By Robert Longo
Located in New York, NY
A very good impression of this lithograph with embossing on Arches. One of 4 numbered printer's proofs, aside from the edition of 30. Signed and dated in pencil, lower right, and ins...
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1980s Contemporary Robert Longo Abstract Prints

Materials

Lithograph

Rick
By Robert Longo
Located in New York, NY
A very good impression of this large lithograph on Arches Cover. Signed, dated and numbered 44/170 in pencil by Longo. There were also 30 artist’s proofs and 18 hors-commerce Publish...
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1990s Contemporary Robert Longo Abstract Prints

Materials

Lithograph

Black Flag
By Robert Longo
Located in Ljubljana, SI
Original mixed media/relief print, 1999. Edition of H.C. (hors commerce – print made for the editors; edition 10) signed and numbered impressions on Arches paper. Robert Longo is an...
Category

1990s Contemporary Robert Longo Abstract Prints

Materials

Mixed Media

Untitled (Flag)
By Robert Longo
Located in New York, NY
Untitled (Flag), 2013 Archival pigment print 26 1/4 × 43 in (66.7 × 109.2 cm) Edition of 36
Category

2010s Contemporary Robert Longo Abstract Prints

Materials

Archival Pigment

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Praise, Limited Edition, Dalton natural bond paper gold stamp signature 573/1000
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Previously Available Items
Robert Longo Vinyl Record Art (Robert Longo moon)
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Robert Longo (untitled) Moon In Shadow record art: Off-set print on vinyl record. 2007. 12 inches in diameter. Excellent Condition. Un...
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Robert Longo Vinyl Record Art (Robert Longo moon)
By Robert Longo
Located in NEW YORK, NY
Robert Longo (untitled) Moon In Shadow record art: Off-set print on vinyl record. 2007. 12 inches in diameter. Excellent Condition. Unsigned from an edition of 5000. Reverse side illustration by Raymond Pettibon (see last image). Published by Visionaire Fashion, 2007 in conjunction with Metro Pictures New York. Looks quite cool framed. Robert Longo burst onto the New York art scene as a brash 25-year-old with “Men in the Cities,” his iconic 1983 large-scale charcoal drawings of businessmen posing in uncanny contortions. “I always imagine that I want to make art that is going to kill you,” he said in 1984. “Whether it’s going to do it visually or physically, I’ll take either way.” Longo works and reworks his charcoal into thick-textured surfaces, giving his velvety drawings deep, blackened expanses and sharply contrasting whites; his forms are at once representational and softly elusive. Having been fascinated with popular culture as a child, Longo centers his practice on transposing images and the resulting transformation of meaning, linking him with the Pictures Generation. “An artist should know art history,” he says. “Shock value only lasts so long.” His recent works have included series depicting women in burkas, ocean waves, nuclear explosions, views of Sigmund Freud’s apartment, and zoo animals in cages. Related Categories: Robert Longo Moon Shadow. Robert Longo photograph. Robert Longo prints...
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Robert Longo Vinyl Record Art (Robert Longo moon)
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Located in NEW YORK, NY
Robert Longo (untitled) Moon In Shadow record art: Off-set print on vinyl record. 2007. 12 inches in diameter. Excellent Condition. Unsigned from an edition of 5000. Reverse side illustration by Raymond Pettibon (see last image). Published by Visionaire Fashion, 2007 in conjunction with Metro Pictures New York. Looks quite cool framed. Robert Longo burst onto the New York art scene as a brash 25-year-old with “Men in the Cities,” his iconic 1983 large-scale charcoal drawings of businessmen posing in uncanny contortions. “I always imagine that I want to make art that is going to kill you,” he said in 1984. “Whether it’s going to do it visually or physically, I’ll take either way.” Longo works and reworks his charcoal into thick-textured surfaces, giving his velvety drawings deep, blackened expanses and sharply contrasting whites; his forms are at once representational and softly elusive. Having been fascinated with popular culture as a child, Longo centers his practice on transposing images and the resulting transformation of meaning, linking him with the Pictures Generation. “An artist should know art history,” he says. “Shock value only lasts so long.” His recent works have included series depicting women in burkas, ocean waves, nuclear explosions, views of Sigmund Freud’s apartment, and zoo animals in cages. Related Categories: Robert Longo Moon Shadow. Robert Longo photograph. Robert Longo prints...
Category

Early 2000s Contemporary Robert Longo Abstract Prints

Materials

Offset, Lithograph

Robert Longo Vinyl Record Art (Robert Longo moon)
By Robert Longo
Located in NEW YORK, NY
Robert Longo (untitled) Moon In Shadow record art: Off-set print on vinyl record. 2007. 12 inches in diameter. Excellent Condition. Unsigned from an edition of 5000. Reverse side illustration by Raymond Pettibon (see last image). Published by Visionaire Fashion, 2007 in conjunction with Metro Pictures New York. Looks quite cool framed. Robert Longo burst onto the New York art scene as a brash 25-year-old with “Men in the Cities,” his iconic 1983 large-scale charcoal drawings of businessmen posing in uncanny contortions. “I always imagine that I want to make art that is going to kill you,” he said in 1984. “Whether it’s going to do it visually or physically, I’ll take either way.” Longo works and reworks his charcoal into thick-textured surfaces, giving his velvety drawings deep, blackened expanses and sharply contrasting whites; his forms are at once representational and softly elusive. Having been fascinated with popular culture as a child, Longo centers his practice on transposing images and the resulting transformation of meaning, linking him with the Pictures Generation. “An artist should know art history,” he says. “Shock value only lasts so long.” His recent works have included series depicting women in burkas, ocean waves, nuclear explosions, views of Sigmund Freud’s apartment, and zoo animals in cages. Related Categories: Robert Longo Moon Shadow. Robert Longo photograph. Robert Longo prints...
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Museum für Moderne Kunst, Uranus - 2000s- Robert Longo - Offset - Contemporary
By Robert Longo
Located in Roma, IT
Offset poster of the Museum für Moderne Kunst, Uranus, realized by Robert Longo in 2005. Hand-signed on the lower right with a silver marker. Good condi...
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Robert Longo abstract prints for sale on 1stDibs.

Find a wide variety of authentic Robert Longo abstract prints available for sale on 1stDibs. If you’re browsing the collection of abstract prints to introduce a pop of color in a neutral corner of your living room or bedroom, you can find work that includes elements of purple and other colors. You can also browse by medium to find art by Robert Longo in lithograph, mixed media, archival pigment print and more. Much of the original work by this artist or collective was created during the 20th century and is mostly associated with the contemporary style. Not every interior allows for large Robert Longo abstract prints, so small editions measuring 12 inches across are available. Customers who are interested in this artist might also find the work of Donald Baechler, Richard Hull, and George Condo. Robert Longo abstract prints prices can differ depending upon medium, time period and other attributes. On 1stDibs, the price for these items starts at $200 and tops out at $55,000, while the average work can sell for $5,500.
Questions About Robert Longo Abstract Prints
  • 1stDibs ExpertApril 5, 2022
    Robert Longo uses cold roll paper. The artist himself explained in an interview that the paper he prefers is not handmade, instead it is machine-made, archival paper. Longo is best known for his paintings that capture realistic moments and express the inner strength of his subjects. Shop a selection of Longo pieces from some of the world’s top art dealers on 1stDibs.
  • 1stDibs ExpertApril 5, 2022
    With roots in sculpture, contemporary artist Robert Longo is best known for his charcoal and graphite drawings, which showcased men and women in mid-movement. You can shop a selection of Robert Longo pieces from some of the world’s top dealers on 1stDibs.

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