Apocalypse Now
Christopher Wool
CHRISTOPHER WOOL, 1987. ALKYD AND FLASHE ON STEEL AND ALUMINUM
In the shadow of the 1987 Black Monday stock market crash, Wool’s Apocalypse Now became the painting of the decade. Taking the quotation from Captain Colby’s letter home in Francis Ford Coppola's war epic, Wool distorts the phrase, removes the emotion or madness inherent in the original and presents with telegraphic urgency. By removing punctuation, correct spacing and line alignment, he forces the view to work to translate the text into a coherent phrase. Wool’s piece is cold and direct, a hiccup in the comprehension adding to a feeling of the untethered. He captures the fear and euphoria of the 1980s, and of the periods that have come after by combining a dark sense of unease with high-flying success.