Komar & Melamid

Vitaly Komar and Alex Melamid are New York-based Russian émigrés whose tongue-in-cheek method of art has seen them hailed simply because postmodern geniuses and denounced simply because publicity-seeking pranksters. Their most well-known task, The People’s Choice (1994), discovered the duo finding a customer testing agency to execute market research research in a number of countries to learn what the common person’s aesthetic likes were, and generating paintings to illustrate what each one of these countries’ most and least desired paintings would appear to be. Both a amusing parody of the idea of “artwork for individuals” and a directed critique of how completely general market trends and polling affects lifestyle, The People’s Choice was a questionable but successful task. In 1996, Komar & Melamid made a decision to explore the way the People’s Choice would adjust to additional artwork forms, and by using musician/composer Dave Soldier (innovator from the Soldier String Quartet as well as the avant-garde blues-rock clothing the Kropotkins), produced a fresh poll to determine American preferences in music. After a thorough group of polls and studies, Soldier made up, under Komar & Melamid’s guidance, “PROBABLY THE MOST Wanted Track” and “MINIMAL Wanted Track.” Both compositions were after that documented and released in 1997. Soldier also co-created an unproduced opera, Nude Trend, with Komar & Melamid in 1996.