Bruce Nauman (b. 1941)

Details
Bruce Nauman (b. 1941)

Run from Fear, Fun from Rear

signed and dated B Nauman 72 lower right--colored pencils and graphite on paper
29 x 24in. (73.6 x 61cm.)
Provenance
Konrad Fischer, Düsseldorf
Literature
C. van Bruggen, D. Koepplin and F. Meyer, Bruce Nauman Drawings 1965-1986, Basel 1986, no. 254 (illustrated)

Lot Essay

This is a working drawing for the first version of the neon Run from Fear, Run From Fear.
Run from Fear, inspired by a graffito of that phrase on a Pasadena bridge--spray painted in red letters four or five feet high--is an admonition of grave concern which belies the sexual banter of its anagram, Fun from Rear. An earlier drawing for the neon specified only one line, in which F and R would flash in alteration (B. Richardson, Bruce Nauman: Neons, Baltimore 1983, p. 30).