Felix Gonzalez-Torres

“Untitled”, 1992

Tattoo

Size varies with individual

Unlimited edition

In 1992, Felix Gonzalez-Torres made an endless edition in the form of a tattoo. Created prior to his one-person museum exhibition at Renaissance Society, this work’s connection to the body resonates with the intimacy and meditations on the ephemerality, and magic, of human life that runs throughout the artist’s practice. The work consists of a ring of dolphins, which a purchaser can have tattooed anywhere on their body, one time. (You may also gift the tattoo).

While exact significance of the dolphin symbol isn’t specified, in keeping with Gonzalez-Torres’s tendency to resist any single interpretation, the continuous circle contains echoes of the ouroboros, an ancient symbol depicting a serpent or dragon eating its own tail to represent the concept of eternity and endless return. Once the work is realized, its physical existence is linked to the individual owner’s lifespan–yet the ‘unlimited’ edition size suggests a certain kind of renewed existence. A democratic ethos, and the poetic possibilities of considering the human body as a site for personal memory and politics, underscore Gonzalez-Torres’s unwavering affirmation of art as a medium for transformation, even if barely perceptible. As curator Hamza Walker wrote on the occasion of the 1994 exhibition at the Renaissance Society, the artist’s work is, “[...] whether through a reflection on death or through joy wrought from the simplest thing, […] ultimately an affirmation of life.”