54 Facts About Marisol Escobar

Marisol Escobar, otherwise known simply as Marisol, was a Venezuelan-American sculptor born in Paris, who lived and worked in New York City.

Marisol Escobar became world-famous in the mid-1960s, but lapsed into relative obscurity within a decade.

Marisol Escobar continued to create her artworks and returned to the limelight in the early 21st century, capped by a 2014 major retrospective show organized by the Memphis Brooks Museum of Art.

Maria Sol Marisol Escobar was born on May 22,1930, to Venezuelan parents in Paris, France.

Marisol Escobar decided to not speak again after her mother's passing, although she made exceptions for answering questions in school or other requirements; she did not regularly speak out loud until her early twenties.

Marisol Escobar had begun drawing early in life, with her parents encouraging her talent by taking her to museums.

Marisol Escobar frequently earned artistic prizes in school before settling in Los Angeles in 1946.

Marisol Escobar additionally displayed talent in embroidery, spending at least three years embroidering the corner of a tablecloth.

In 1946, when Marisol Escobar was 16, the family relocated to Los Angeles; she was enrolled at the Marymount High School in Los Angeles.

Marisol Escobar did not fit in at this institution and was expelled; she transferred to the Westlake School for Girls in 1948.

Marisol Escobar began her formal arts education in 1946 with night classes at the Otis Art Institute and the Jepson Art Institute in Los Angeles, where she studied under Howard Warshaw and Rico Lebrun.

Marisol Escobar studied art at the Paris Ecole des Beaux-Arts in 1949.

Marisol Escobar then returned to the United States and moved to New York to begin studies at the Art Students League of New York, at the New School for Social Research, and she was a student of artist Hans Hofmann at his schools in New York and Provincetown.

On her return, Marisol Escobar quickly became associated with the pop art movement as it emerged in the 1960s, enhancing her recognition and popularity.

Marisol Escobar took inspiration from found objects, such as a piece of wood that became her Mona Lisa sculpture, and an old couch that became The Visit.

Marisol Escobar became a friend of Andy Warhol in the early 1960s; she made a sculptural portrait of him, and he invited her to appear in several of his early films, including The Kiss and 13 Most Beautiful Girls.

Marisol Escobar imitated and exaggerated the behaviors of the popular public.

Marisol Escobar mimicked the role of femininity in her sculptural grouping Women and Dog, which she produced between 1963 and 1964.

The sculptural practice of Marisol Escobar simultaneously distanced herself from her subject, while reintroducing the artist's presence through a range of self-portraiture found in every sculpture.

Unlike the majority of Pop artists, Marisol Escobar included her own presence within the critique she produced.

Marisol Escobar used her body as a reference for a range of drawings, paintings, photographs, and casts.

Marisol Escobar further deconstructed the idea of true femininity in her sculptural grouping The Party, which featured a large number of figures adorned in found objects of the latest fashion.

Marisol Escobar mimicked the imaginary construct of what it means to be a woman, as well as the role of the "artist".

Marisol Escobar accomplished this through combining sensibilities of both Action painting and Pop art.

Marisol Escobar utilized the spontaneous gesture of expression within Action painting along with the cool and collected artistic intent of Pop art.

Marisol Escobar's sculptures questioned the authenticity of the constructed self, suggesting it was instead contrived from representational parts.

But, by incorporating casts of her own hands and expressional strokes in her work, Marisol Escobar combined symbols of the 'artist' identity celebrated throughout art history.

Marisol Escobar deliberately chose an image of de Gaulle, who was known to always be composed, as an older man.

Marisol Escobar Manipulated his crucial characteristics, mannerisms, and attributes to effectively subvert his position of power as one of vulnerability.

Marisol Escobar's uniform, cast hand, and static carriage made the sculpture overtly asymmetrical to suggest the general public's concern for government correctness.

Marisol Escobar produced satiric social commentaries in concern to gender and race, which being a woman of color is a circumstance she lives in.

Marisol Escobar appeared in several early films by Warhol, among them The Kiss and 13 Most Beautiful Girls.

Marisol Escobar suggests a strong shared influence from both the Ashcan School and the form of Comics in general.

Marisol Escobar was said to have spoken no more than she needed to, and in her work she been described as having to bestowed silence with 'form and weight'.

Marisol Escobar talked little of her career and once stated, 'I have always been very fortunate.

Marisol Escobar depicted him with two copies of his trademark smoking pipe, one painted, and the other a real one projecting aggressively from the front of the piece.

Marisol Escobar has often included portraits of public figures, family members and friends in her sculpture.

Marisol Escobar did a work based on da Vinci's The Virgin with St Anne.

Marisol Escobar's image is included in the iconic 1972 poster Some Living American Women Artists by Mary Beth Edelson.

Marisol Escobar was one of many artists disregarded due to the existing modernist canon, which positioned her outside of the core of pop as the feminine opposite to her established male counterparts.

Marisol Escobar was one of the few who embraced her gender identity.

Critical evaluation of Marisol Escobar's practice concluded that her feminine view was a reason to separate her from other Pop artists, as she offered sentimental satire rather than a deadpan attitude.

Yet, Lippard primarily spoke of the ways in which Marisol Escobar's work differentiated from the intentions of Pop figureheads Frank Stella, Roy Lichtenstein, and Donald Judd.

Unlike Pop artists of the period, Marisol Escobar's sculpture acted as a satiric criticism of contemporary life in which her presence was included in the representations of upper middle-class femininity.

Marisol Escobar depicted the human vulnerability that was common to all subjects within a feminist critique and differentiated from the controlling male viewpoint of her Pop art associates.

Critical evaluation of Marisol Escobar's practice concluded that her feminine view was a reason to separate her from other Pop artists, as she offered sentimental satire rather than a deadpan attitude.

Marisol Escobar's wit was disregarded as feminine playfulness, therefore, lacking the objectivity and expressionless attitude of male pop artists.

Marisol Escobar received awards including the 1997 Premio Gabriela Mistral from the Organization of American States for her contribution to Inter-American culture.

Marisol Escobar was elected to membership in the American Academy of Arts and Letters in 1978.

Marisol Escobar created a series of wood sculptures in the 1990s, mostly depicting Native Americans.

In 2004, Marisol Escobar's work was featured in "MoMA at El Museo", an exhibition of Latin American artists held at the Museum of Modern Art.

Marisol Escobar's work has attracted increased interest, including a major retrospective in 2014 at the Memphis Brooks Museum of Art in Memphis, Tennessee, which became her first solo show in New York City, at Museo del Barrio.

Marisol Escobar last lived in the TriBeCa district of New York City, and was in frail health towards the end of her life.

Marisol Escobar suffered from Alzheimer's disease, and died on April 30,2016, in New York City from pneumonia, aged 85.