All The Other Felix Gonzalez-Torres Dancing Platforms

So “Untitled” (Go-Go Dancing Platform), 1991, is unique, but it is not the only one. Now that it has ~~sold~~ “a serious hold” and a $US16m asking price, let’s take a look at the six [!] related works Felix Gonzalez-Torres made. And then decided were not works after all. What are they, where are they, and what is to be done with them?

“Untitled” (Go-Go Dancing Platform), 1991, which we’ll call #1, was on view for just over a week (Week 3) in Felix’s March 1991 show at Andrea Rosen Gallery, Every Week There Is Something Different. [Carol Bove restaged this show as her part of the collaborative retrospective with Elena Filipovic at the Fondation Beyeler in 2011.] It’s the one we all know: 21 1/2 inches high and six feet square, with 48 lights embedded in the edge.

In his 1994 Parkett essay Simon Watney wrote how Felix “relays meanings between different works, by means of the formal development of individual elements. Thus the row of light bulbs from “Untitled” (Go-Go Dance Platform) [sic] from 1991 have now taken on a formal life of their own in numerous subsequent light pieces involving strings of light bulbs.”

The platform, or pedestal, which look like the stacks, are another such element, one which relates not only to Minimalist sculpture, but to exhibition and display.

a hand holds a book spread open, with a full page photo of a muscly go-go dancer in silver shorts facing away from ther camera, and grooving on top of a pale blue square platform ringed with soft white light bulbs. on the right is a grid of twelve photos of another muscly white guy on a lightbulb-topped pedestal, only this one is narrow and alarmingly tall, and the guy is photographed in various stages of teasing undress, like he's gonna take his crop top and tighty whities off, which he does in some of the photos. these two works are both "untltled" (go-go dancing platform), 1991, by felix gonzalez torres, but only the left one is now recognized as a valid artwork. and it may be selling in 2025 for $16 million — One image of OG *“Untitled” (Go-Go Dancing Platform)*, 1991, and twelve images of *“Untitled” (Go-Go Dancing Platform)*, 1991, in the 1993 A.R.T. Press monograph, via mullenbooks

Later in 1991 Gonzalez-Torres made “Untitled” (Go-Go Dancing Platform)” [#2]. It was listed in the catalogue raisonné as 60 x 16 x 16 inches, which means it’s either a typo or an OSHA nightmare. Reader, it is the latter. I’m still trying to find out where this platform was shown, but it can be seen in the 1993 Felix Gonzalez-Torres monograph published by A.R.T. Press [above]. Though it looks impossible to dance on, its narrow pedestal form is one Felix used frequently, so it has an interesting place in his work. But with the white briefs and crop top, this looks to me more like an “Untitled” (Stripper Platform).

The first work in 1992 that Felix kept was his first light string, “Untitled”, which is actually an edition of 2. But in Andrea Rosen Gallery’s inventory it’s listed as ARG #GF 1992-6. The first five, ARG #GF 1992-1 thru 5, all “Untitled”, are all platforms or pedestals.

[Next day update]: Turns out the Foundation has published documentation of some of these non-works under their ARG number, including Ghislaine Hussenot’s office pedestal, below:

an elegant white lady sits at a chrome and black desk with office accoutrements around and behind her, on a wooden platform that fits into the corner of her art gallery office. the pedestal is painted pale blue and has white light bulbs along the two outer edges. a non-work by felix gonzalez torres installed in 1992 at galerie ghislaine hussenot in paris — “Untitled”, 1992, ARF #GF 1992-1, feels like a custom job. I can immediately see how it differs from a go-go dancing platform. Installation view of “By Arrangement,” Feb-Mar 1992, at Galerie Ghislaine Hussenot, photo Andre Morain via FG-T Fndn

Three are like “Untitled” (Go-Go Dancing Platform), painted, with lights on two or three sides, and with different dimensions. For the office of Galerie Ghislaine Hussenot, where Felix had a three-part show in 1992 [update: wrong show.], a platform [non-work XXVII, ARG #GF 1992-1], was seemingly made to metric specs: 18 x 210 x 185 cm. For Andrea Rosen’s own office, it was 6 x 60 x 60 in. [non-work XXXI] Both had lights on two sides. Another platform [non-work XXVIII], with lights on three sides, measured 6 x 72 x 48 in. No idea where that went.

One platform/pedestal [non-work XXX] made for a group show was 8 x 98 x 30 in. and covered in industrial carpet. I feel like I’ve looked for and found no information about this one.

a slightly off white painted wood pedestal a foot high and 40 inches on each side has one side propped up like a box trap, with underwear and some harnesses peeking out from below, a non-work by felix gonzalez-torres photographed ni the mezzanine at galerie ghislaine hussenot in paris in 1992 — Absolutely love this, what was he trying to trap, exactly, with this bait? “Untitled”, 1992, ARG # GF 1992-3 installed upstairs in “By Arrangement” at Galerie Ghislaine Hussenot, via FG-T Fndn

The remaining one, [non-work XXIX, ARG # GF 1992-3] is not the last, and it may have been not only for dancing. The 12 x 40 x 40 in. pedestal of painted wood has/had no lights, but it did have “leather and rubber harnesses, g-strings, [and] underwear” underneath it.

a square sculpture eight inches high made of blue mirror sits on a plywood floor, reflecting a skylight and bookshelf in the lehman maupin gallery in this 1997 photo of felix gonzalez-torres' 1992 work "Untitled" (Fear). — “Untitled” (Fear), 1992, blue mirror, 8 1/2 x 30 1/2 x 30 1/2 in., installed in 1997 at Lehman Maupin via FG-T Fndn

Then in 1992, he made “Untitled” (Fear), a pedestal-shaped sculpture in blue mirror, which feels like a ghost of a go-go dancing platform. And “Untitled” (Go-Go Dancing Platform) began to be shown in museums, and it hasn’t really stopped. Given the parameters of the work, the feasibility of refabricating it for loans, and the involvement of live bodies, it’s easy to see how Gonzalez-Torres decided “Untitled” (Go-Go Dancing Platform) should be unique. But for understanding his process and the development of his ideas, the rest of the platforms remain important and valuable; there’s a lot of room between $16 million and “deleted from the discourse.”