Acrylic paint on paper
Text and Language
Pop Art and its Legacy
Tate Collection
Works with images
General Collection
ARTIST ROOMS
National Heritage Memorial Fund
Art Fund
Collection
<a href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/edward-ruscha-1882" aria-label="More by Edward Ruscha" data-gtm-name="header_link_artist" data-gtm-destination="page--artist">Edward Ruscha</a>
HONK
ARTIST ROOMS
Acquired jointly with the National Galleries of Scotland through The d'Offay Donation with assistance from the National Heritage Memorial Fund and the Art Fund 2008
abstraction
colour
emotions, concepts and ideas
formal qualities
inscriptions
non-representational
symbols and personifications
text
title of work
<p><span>HONK </span>depicts its title word in diagonally-inclined, capitalised serif typography. The letters are filled in with a bright yellow acrylic paint and sit in front of a rich, dark blue background, trailing an area of deep red that is perpendicular to the yellow lettering, giving a suggestion of depth within the picture plane. The diagonal slant on which the word ‘HONK’ is aligned roughly slices the picture in half, from the top left to bottom right corner. This is a compositional device also used by the artist in <span>Standard Study # 3 </span>1963 (Tate AR00050). Ruscha studied graphic design at the Chouinard Art Institute (now California Institute of the Arts) in the late 1950s, and later worked as a layout artist at a Los Angeles advertising agency. In the same year that this drawing was made, Ruscha was included in the exhibition <span>New Painting of Common Objects</span> at Pasadena Art Museum, generally regarded as the first museum exhibition of pop art, alongside artists such as Andy Warhol (1928–87) and Roy Lichtenstein (1923–97).</p>
paper unique acrylic paint
18 September 2010 – 16 April 2011
2011-04-16
18 September 2010 – 20 November 2010
2010-11-20
2010-09-18
Inverness Museum & Art Gallery (Inverness, UK)
http://www.invernessmuseum.com
15 January 2011 – 26 February 2011
2011-02-26
2011-01-15
Swanson Gallery (Thurso, UK)
http://www.highland.gov.uk/leisureandtourism/what-to-see/arts/ar
5 March 2011 – 16 April 2011
2011-04-16
2011-03-05
Timespan (Sutherland, UK)
http://www.timespan.org.uk/
2010-09-18
ARTIST ROOMS 2010: Highland Touring Circuit - Ed Ruscha
Loan-out
28 May 2011 – 29 October 2011
2011-10-29
28 May 2011 – 29 October 2011
2011-10-29
2011-05-28
Wolverhampton Art Gallery (Wolverhampton, UK)
http://www.wolverhamptonart.org.uk
2011-05-28
ARTIST ROOMS 2011: Ed Ruscha
Loan-out
29 April 2017 – 29 April 2018
2018-04-29
29 April 2017 – 29 April 2018
2018-04-29
2017-04-29
Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art (Edinburgh, UK)
http://www.nationalgalleries.org/
2017-04-29
ARTIST ROOMS Ed Ruscha
Collection based display
22 July 2019 – 18 July 2021
2021-07-18
22 July 2019 – 18 July 2021
2021-07-18
2019-07-22
Tate Modern (London, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/modern/
2019-07-22
AR Ed Ruscha
Collection based display
HONK
support: 279 × 352 mm
frame: 455 × 630 × 31 mm
<a href="/search?gid=999999788" data-gtm-name="tombstone_link_bequest" data-gtm-destination="list-page--search-results">ARTIST ROOMS</a>
Acquired jointly with the National Galleries of Scotland through The d'Offay Donation with assistance from the <a href="/search?gid=999999967" data-gtm-name="tombstone_link_bequest" data-gtm-destination="list-page--search-results">National Heritage Memorial Fund</a> and the <a href="/search?gid=999999968" data-gtm-name="tombstone_link_bequest" data-gtm-destination="list-page--search-results">Art Fund</a> 2008
<div class="text">
<p>
<i>HONK </i>depicts its title word in diagonally-inclined, capitalised serif typography. The letters are filled in with a bright yellow acrylic paint and sit in front of a rich, dark blue background, trailing an area of deep red that is perpendicular to the yellow lettering, giving a suggestion of depth within the picture plane. The diagonal slant on which the word ‘HONK’ is aligned roughly slices the picture in half, from the top left to bottom right corner. This is a compositional device also used by the artist in <i>Standard Study # 3 </i>1963 (Tate <a class="acno-pop" data-gtm-destination="page--artwork" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/ruscha-standard-study-3-ar00050" title="View the details of this artwork"><span>AR00050</span></a>). Ruscha studied graphic design at the Chouinard Art Institute (now California Institute of the Arts) in the late 1950s, and later worked as a layout artist at a Los Angeles advertising agency. In the same year that this drawing was made, Ruscha was included in the exhibition <i>New Painting of Common Objects</i> at Pasadena Art Museum, generally regarded as the first museum exhibition of pop art, alongside artists such as Andy Warhol (1928–87) and Roy Lichtenstein (1923–97).</p>
<p>With its palette restricted to the three primary colours, <i>HONK</i> is reminiscent of sign painting and graphic design in its bold clarity and legibility. However, unlike many of Ruscha’s other drawings of sentences, phrases or single words, such as <i>ARTISTS WHO DO BOOKS</i> 1976 (Tate <a class="acno-pop" data-gtm-destination="page--artwork" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/ruscha-artists-who-do-books-ar00056" title="View the details of this artwork"><span>AR00056</span></a>), here the text was not created with the use of stencils but was drawn freehand with acrylic paint and a brush, with no indication of prior measurement, templates or other technical aids. While the paint achieves an almost totally opaque coverage over the paper, brush marks are visible in the red and blue areas, and across the blue section some of the paper’s wove surface is visible, creating a slightly stippled, textured effect. These details remind the viewer that although the artist is working within a graphic idiom that is suggestive of advertising and film titles, the drawing remains a unique, hand-made object and not one of mass reproduction. </p>
<p>The diagonal composition and exclusive use of primary colours link this drawing to Ruscha’s series of works based on the Twentieth Century Fox studio logo, such as <i>Trademark #5</i> 1962 (Tate <a class="acno-pop" data-gtm-destination="page--artwork" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/ruscha-trademark-5-t07510" title="View the details of this artwork"><span>T07510</span></a>). Both this work and <i>HONK</i> engage with the visual language of cinema, echoing the dramatic presentation of its iconography and movie titles to create works that combine pop art with Hollywood mythology. </p>
<p>The extreme edges of the area of red paint behind the ‘H’ and the ‘K’ of ‘HONK’ take the form of fiery curls and licks, suggesting a trail of cartoon flames that invest the word with an incendiary power to match the loudness of the colours and meaning of ‘honk’. The theatrical nature of this work is readily apparent in its punchy visual appearance and the onomatopoeic quality of the word itself. As the curator Ralph Rugoff has noted regarding a series of paintings ‘that depict burning architectural structures’ completed by the artist in the mid-1960s, ‘Ruscha seemed to use fire as a visual analogue for noise’ (Rugoff 2009, p.17). </p>
<p>The curator Kerry Brougher has quoted Ruscha regarding his use of words as subjects for his work: ‘“When you think about it, words are really horizontal objects. You’re almost making a landscape.” Ruscha’s words hover between the flat, traversal surfaces of the graphic artist and the longitudinal, deep-space world of landscape painting.’ (Brougher 2000, p.161.) <i>HONK</i> was completed only two years after Ruscha had graduated from art school. In an interview over twenty years later, the artist reflected upon this productive early period, commenting: </p>
<p class="cttext">
</p><blockquote>I’ve noticed when I look back on my work that most of my early works had less of a fascination with the English language than they did with just trying to imitate monosyllabic words like ‘smash’, ‘oof’. They all were power words like that … I think that I could have been involved in painting an environment for what the word sounded like and looked like at the same time. </blockquote>
<blockquote>(Ruscha and Schwartz 2002, p.191.) </blockquote>
<p>
<b>Further reading </b>
<br/>Kerry Brougher, ‘Words as Landscape’ in <i>Ed Ruscha</i>, exhibition catalogue, Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington, D.C., and Museum of Modern Art, Oxford 2000, pp.157–77.<br/>Edward Ruscha and Alexandra Schwartz (eds.), <i>Leave Any Information at the Signal: Writings, Interviews, Bits, Pages</i>, Cambridge, Massachusetts and London 2002. <br/>Ralph Rugoff, ‘Heavenly Noises’, in <i>Ed Ruscha: Fifty Years of Painting</i>, exhibition catalogue, Hayward Gallery, London 2009, pp.11–27.</p>
<p>Stephanie Straine <br/>April 2010</p>
</div>

Summary
2012-07-12T00:00:00
summary
SHORT_TEXT
<p>The sound and effects of a car horn are suggested through the composition and brash colours of the graphic letters which appear to come to a sudden halt on the page. Ruscha frequently used visual alliteration in this way to conjure up the words he chose to paint. ‘Honk’ suggests the artist’s fascination with cars and highways and the impact of these post-war consumer industries on cities and towns in the United States. The word is also of the type found in comic books used to bring to life the ongoing narrative.</p>

Online caption
2009-04-16T00:00:00
online-caption
ONLINE_CAPTION
abstraction colour emotions, concepts and ideas formal qualities inscriptions non-representational symbols and personifications text title of work