Viewing Room | George Condo. Crazy Cat Combination, 1989–1990

"It’s about dismantling one reality and constructing another from the same parts."

– George Condo

Crazy Cat Combination, created between 1989 and 1990, is a vibrant and playful homage to the American cartoonist George Herriman, best known for his comic strip Krazy Kat. This monumental composition brings together nine works originally conceived as individual paintings, which Condo then assembled in a manner reminiscent of classic comic book pages.

Condo doesn't quote Herriman directly: he takes the comic's rhythmic structure and translates it into a fractured, expressionistic composition that captures its constant transformations. He cranks up the disjunction, distortion, and visual tempo to highlight how Herriman's innovative sequencing and fluid use of space influenced modern narrative form - the comic's architecture proved as significant as its characters or humor.

Condo’s compositional choice to unite these separately painted portraits on a single canvas brings clear parallels to the tradition of salon-style hanging, where disparate works are clustered together to create a dense visual dialogue. By orchestrating his own version of this arrangement, he turns the painting into a curated wall within the picture plane—a kind of artist-constructed display space authored by himself. The viewer encounters not one scene but a deliberately assembled constellation of images, each asserting its individuality while contributing to a larger, orchestrated narrative.

1. George Condo. Crazy Cat Combination, 1989–1990 (detail) © Gary Tatintsian Gallery and the artist

2. Burgundian Master. Portrait of a man holding a prayer book, bust-length, in a fur-lined coat and cap, circa 1480 © Private collection

1. Elisabeth Louise Vigée Le Brun. Self Portrait in a Straw Hat, 1782 © The National Gallery, London, England, UK.
2, 3. George Condo. Crazy Cat Combination, 1989–1990 (detail) © Gary Tatintsian Gallery and the artist