The story behind Tom Friedman’s bubblegum sculptures
A perfectly spherical bubble gum, a toothpick bursting star, a sugarcube man. These are just some of the works of artist Tom Friedman.
Missouri-born Friedman is known for transforming ordinary objects, many of which we would typically discard after using them, into art pieces, fluctuating between the comical and conceptual.
For example, his bubblegum piece is a perfect pink sphere, almost resin-like, that has been made of 1,500 pieces of chewed bubble gum. At first, one would say ‘how gross’, but without knowing its contents, this shiny ball doesn’t come remotely close to resembling chewed up gum, which challenges our perception of material function and appearance.
The same goes for Untitled Self Portrait, a tiny carving of a man’s profile which was shockingly done out of a single aspirin tablet. Friedman is really competing with marble-magician Michelangelo here – he’s intricately carved every detail of the face, down to the undulating ear cartilages, out of the tiny surface of the aspirin tablet. Friedman provokes us with the choice of medium, as it strongly resembles the highly prestigious Carrara marble used by the old Renaissance and Baroque masters.
Friedman challenges the viewer to think about what constitutes art, by using simple objects we’d find in our house, and repurposing them into something exhibition-worthy. The “unexplored detritus of our daily lives” which we discard as waste, if you will.
In some ways, he suggests that anyone can be an artist, and the practice doesn’t have to be confined to people who have the tools, skills and access to material that we would conventionally require. What might first appear to be a simple, stable structure is, on closer inspection, intricately constructed from unexpected materials such as styrofoam, flock or wire, which undoubtedly requires some serious artistic skill.
However, above technical skill and creativity, Friedman’s prime virtue is patience. He takes great time and care in perfecting his craft, while also telling a story that places him in the artwork’s narrative. For example, he took the time to chew every piece of gum he used, masticating it to the exact consistency he wanted and ensuring each one’s colour stayed the same, or he depicted himself in his aspirin self-portrait. In this way, he reminds the viewer who he is in relation to the piece and makes it more personal.
Patience is also required from the viewer, who is confronted with often abnormally small artworks. Sculptures are traditionally larger, at least half a human body-size or life-size, especially the most famous ones by Renaissance sculptors. However, his artworks are very small, in some cases too small to see from afar for the naked eye. So Friedeman is asking the viewer to take the time to observe his pieces closely in order to understand them properly, and not just judge them at face value. In doing so, again, he is creating a physical closeness between us and him, also mimicking the act of sculpting itself.
Zooming out, the repeated act of chewing the gum, or placing the toothpicks in shape to create the star burst, also might reflect the overwhelming yet never-ending consumerism that humankind has unfortunately gotten used to. This is also reflected in the sheer quantity of each material he’s had to use.
He perfectly describes this by saying: “Art, for me, is a context to slow the viewer’s experience from their everyday life in order to think about things they haven’t thought about. Or to think in a new way.”
