Sawdy

Kienholz was best known for performance-based installations that levied a sharp critique at injustices in the United States—including sexual politics, the Vietnam War, and racial violence. From the 1957 opening of his Ferus Gallery, with critic Walter Hopps, he was a central figure on the experimental arts scene in Los Angeles. Breaking away from conventional abstract sculpture and wood assemblage, Kienholz pioneered a proto-installation format he called “concept tableau.” 

A partially visible silkscreened photograph framed and concealed by the partially opened window of a car door in Sawdy documents Five Car Stud (1969–72), a fictional tableau of racial violence staged by the artist. Installed in the parking lot of the L.A.-based art publisher Gemini G.E.L., five parked cars illuminate a grotesque scene of a black man being castrated by six white men while a white woman cowers in a truck. The title of this piece, Sawdy, comes from the original owner of that truck.