Dario Escobar: The Life of the Object

Guatemalan-born sculptor Darío Escobar (born 1971) is a contemporary master of the kind of aesthetic object that also doubles as a revealing critique of globalization. Since the late 1990s he has mobilized armies of everyday industrial and consumer products--McDonald’s cups, cereal boxes, vulcanized rubber, car bumpers and sports equipment of various types--in order to construct an ongoing dialogue with the reality of global consumerism. That dialogue, invariably, has also incorporated an extensive dialogue with modern and contemporary art. This book covers two decades of this singular artist’s work, while highlighting profound insights into the nature of found objects, commodity culture and contemporary art’s increasing identification with the myths and realities of globalization.

Guatemalan-born sculptor Darío Escobar (born 1971) is a contemporary master of the kind of aesthetic object that also doubles as a revealing critique of globalization. Since the late 1990s he has mobilized armies of everyday industrial and consumer products--McDonald’s cups, cereal boxes, vulcanized rubber, car bumpers and sports equipment of various types--in order to construct an ongoing dialogue with the reality of global consumerism. That dialogue, invariably, has also incorporated an extensive dialogue with modern and contemporary art.

This book covers two decades of this singular artist’s work, while highlighting profound insights into the nature of found objects, commodity culture and contemporary art’s increasing identification with the myths and realities of globalization.