Juan Muñoz

Marian Goodman Gallery, New York
Acquired by the present owner from the above

Washington D.C., Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden; Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles; The Art Institute of Chicago; Contemporary Arts Museum, Houston; Juan Muñoz, October 2001 - March 2003, cat. no. 56, p. 130, illustrated

This work appears in very good overall condition. The elements of the construction are sound and stable. There is evidence of handling and wear, visible in the catalogue illustration. There is evidence of mild oxidation, located particularly in the interior of the car. The various surface nuances appear to be part of the artist's working method.
In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective qualified opinion.
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The car figures prominently in the iconography of modern art history. Affluence, leisure, speed, death, and disaster serve as but a perfunctory list of the myriad associations it conjures.  With Loaded Car, Spanish sculptor, Juan Muñoz approaches this iconographic tradition on his own terms, incorporating themes and motifs that have informed his practice from its inception.

Created for "Streetwise," a 1998 exhibition at SITE Santa Fe organized by director, Louis Grachos, Loaded Car features a steel sedan that has been ominously upturned on its side. Approaching the car, the viewer is soon disabused of any conclusions that he or she may have initially drawn. Eviscerated of its standard components, the interior is absent of seats, dashboard, and steering wheel and is instead incongruously equipped with what appears to be a staircase and a labyrinthine system of  corridors or passageways. Alien to the vehicle, but familiar to Muñoz's oeuvre, architectural elements such as staircases, balconies, banisters, minarets and watchtowers have long preoccupied the artist and serve as cornerstones in his visual repertoire.

In describing the artist's "raincoat drawings," Olga Viso alights on a quality that is equally operative in Loaded Car.  She notes that the works, "give the spectator the impression that he or she has arrived on the scene too late--either immediately before or after the occurrence of some specified event. What remain are the silent charge of mystery and potential narratives pregnant with possibility."  ( Olga Viso, in Exh. Cat. Washington DC, The Hirschorn Museum and Chicago, The Art Institute of Chicago, Juan Muñoz, 2001, p. 168) The viewer, always at the crux of Muñoz's work, is left to contemplate what it all means.