Fabric, hanging piece
Tate Collection
Works with images
General Collection
ARTIST ROOMS
Collection
<a href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/louise-bourgeois-2351" aria-label="More by Louise Bourgeois" data-gtm-name="header_link_artist" data-gtm-destination="page--artist">Louise Bourgeois</a>
Couple I
ARTIST ROOMS 
Tate and National Galleries of Scotland. Lent by Artist Rooms Foundation 2013
<p>The couple represented here appear to merge into each other. As in many of Bourgeois’s works, male and female are combined in an ambiguous arrangement of body parts. For Bourgeois, hanging indicates a state of uncertainty. ‘Horizontality is a desire to give up, to sleep’, she said. ‘Verticality is an attempt to escape. Hanging and floating are states of ambivalence.’</p><p><em>Gallery label, October 2016</em></p>
sculpture fabric hanging piece
26 October 2013 – 18 May 2014
2014-05-18
26 October 2013 – 18 May 2014
2014-05-18
2013-10-26
Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art (Edinburgh, UK)
http://www.nationalgalleries.org/
2013-10-26
ARTIST ROOMS Louise Bourgeois
Collection based display
18 July 2014 – 12 October 2014
2014-10-12
18 July 2014 – 12 October 2014
2014-10-12
2014-07-18
Middlesbrough Institute of Modern Art (Middlesbrough, UK)
http://www.visitmima.com/
2014-07-18
ARTIST ROOMS 2014: Louise Bourgeois
Loan-out
16 January 2015 – 19 April 2015
2015-04-19
16 January 2015 – 19 April 2015
2015-04-19
2015-01-16
Southampton City Art Gallery (Southampton, UK)
http://www.southampton.gov.uk/leisure/arts
2015-01-16
ARTIST ROOMS 2015: Louise Bourgeois
Loan-out
10 June 2016 – 18 June 2017
2017-06-18
10 June 2016 – 18 June 2017
2017-06-18
2016-06-10
Tate Modern (London, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/modern/
2016-06-10
ARTIST ROOMS Louise Bourgeois
Collection based display
1 September 2017 – 18 November 2017
2017-11-18
1 September 2017 – 18 November 2017
2017-11-18
2017-09-01
Perth Museum & Art Gallery (Perth, UK)
http://www.pkc.gov.uk/
2017-09-01
ARTIST ROOMS 2017: Louise Bourgeois
Loan-out
22 January 2019 – 24 March 2019
2019-03-24
22 January 2019 – 31 March 2019
2019-03-31
2019-01-22
Kettle’s Yard (Cambridge, UK)
http://www.kettlesyard.co.uk/
2019-01-22
ARTIST ROOMS 2019: Louise Bourgeois
Loan-out
6 July 2021 – 16 January 2022
2022-01-16
6 July 2021 – 16 January 2022
2022-01-16
2021-07-06
Tate Liverpool (Liverpool, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/liverpool/
2021-07-06
ARTIST ROOMS Louise Bourgeois
Collection based display
19 February 2022 – 15 May 2022
2022-05-15
19 February 2022 – 15 May 2022
2022-05-15
2022-02-19
Kunstmuseum Basel (Basel, Switzerland)
http://www.kunstmuseumbasel.ch
2022-02-19
Louise Bourgeois X Jenny Holzer .The Violence of Handwriting Across a Page
Loan-out
23 July 2022 – 6 October 2024
2024-10-06
18 November 2023 – 11 February 2024
2024-02-11
2023-11-18
Burton Art Gallery and Museum (Bideford, UK)
2 March 2024 – 9 June 2024
2024-06-09
2024-03-02
Aberdeen Art Gallery (Aberdeen, UK)
http://www.aagm.co.uk
6 July 2024 – 6 October 2024
2024-10-06
2024-07-06
Compton Verney (Compton Verney, UK)
2022-07-23
Louise Bourgeois
Loan-out
3 May 2023 – 6 August 2023
2023-08-06
3 May 2023 – 6 August 2023
2023-08-06
2023-05-03
Nasjonalmuseet (Oslo, Norway)
2023-05-03
Louise Bourgeois: Imaginary Conversations
Loan-out
Couple I
object: 2032 × 685 × 711 mm, 15 kg
<a href="/search?gid=999999788" data-gtm-name="tombstone_link_bequest" data-gtm-destination="list-page--search-results">ARTIST ROOMS</a> 
Tate and National Galleries of Scotland. Lent by Artist Rooms Foundation 2013
<div class="text">
<p>
<i>Couple I</i> is a hanging sculpture comprised of two stuffed textile pieces sewn together, depicting two headless, hanging figures in an embrace. Bourgeois used fabric, lace, socks, nylon tights and one of her own blouses to create the sculpture. One figure is made of fabric associated with more masculine clothing; blue pinstriped shirt and black flannel. The other figure has more feminine attributes including a lace collar and stuffed pair of black nylon tights. The arms and legs of the masculine figure are sewn together around a metal meat hook, which is used to hang the work on wire from the ceiling. The feminine figure sits in the looped torso, with nylon legs hanging down at either side and a single limb reaching around the torso of the other fabric body. <i>Couple I </i>formed part of an installation displayed in the bell tower of St Pancras Church in London for the exhibition ‘The Visible and the Invisible’ in 1996. Bourgeois made four figurative stuffed fabric sculptures for this piece: <i>Single I</i> 1996, <i>Single II </i>1996 (Tate <a class="acno-pop" data-gtm-destination="page--artwork" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/bourgeois-single-ii-al00229" title="View the details of this artwork"><span>AL00229</span></a>), <i>Couple I </i>1996 and <i>Couple II </i>1996. All of the sculptures were hung from the bell tower except <i>Couple II</i>, which was displayed nearby on the floor.</p>
<p>In this work Bourgeois addresses the complex nature of relationships. The masculine and feminine figures of <i>Couple I </i>are locked in an embrace that could be read as both supportive and strained. The masculine figure both constricts and holds the feminine figure. Likewise, she encircles him with a caring arm whilst straddling and weighing down his hanging body. The curator Lucy Askew has argued that, ‘hanging from a meat hook, these archetypes lack the capacity to move or part and are bound in an embrace that suggests more anguish than pleasure.’ (Askew and d’Offay 2013, p.83.) Yet their proximity and dependency could also be indicative of an intense emotional attachment as well as the physical act of having sex. Indeed the suspension of <i>Couple I</i> suggests the destabilizing feeling of falling in love. On the notion of the hanging figure, a recurring conceit in Bourgeois’s practice, the artist has said: ‘Horizontality is a desire to give up, to sleep. Verticality is an attempt to escape. Hanging and floating are states of ambivalence.’ (Quoted in Askew and d’Offay 2013, p.48.)</p>
<p>As the figures float in space, they almost form an infinity symbol suggestive of the inexorable cycle of a relationship. Yet the ‘timeless’ nature of the work – we are unsure of the age of the headless figures – might be read as the artist’s reflection on her own past relationships. This correlates with curator Marie-Laure Bernadac’s argument that Bourgeois’s intense focus on the nature of sexual relationships between men and women in her later career ‘can be seen to derive from the return of repressed memories.’ (Quoted in Morris 2007, p.90.)</p>
<p>
<b>Further reading</b>
<br/>Mignon Nixon, <i>Fantastic Reality: Louise Bourgeois and a Story of Modern Art</i>, Cambridge, Massachusetts, and London 2005.<br/>Frances Morris (ed.), <i>Louise Bourgeois</i>, exhibition catalogue, Tate Modern, London 2007, pp.90–2, reproduced p.92.<br/>Lucy Askew and Anthony d’Offay, <i>Louise Bourgeois: A Woman Without Secrets</i>, exhibition catalogue, National Galleries of Scotland, Edinburgh 2013, p.83, reproduced pp.25, 47.</p>
<p>Allan Madden<br/>The University of Edinburgh<br/>January 2015</p>
<p>
<i>The University of Edinburgh is a research partner of ARTIST ROOMS.</i>
</p>
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Summary
2016-07-12T00:00:00
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SHORT_TEXT
<div class="text">
<p>The couple represented here appear to merge into each other. As in many of Bourgeois’s works, male and female are combined in an ambiguous arrangement of body parts. For Bourgeois, hanging indicates a state of uncertainty. ‘Horizontality is a desire to give up, to sleep’, she said. ‘Verticality is an attempt to escape. Hanging and floating are states of ambivalence.’</p>
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2016-10-12T00:00:00
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