Robert Longo made a breakthrough at the very beginning of his career with his series of graphite and charcoal drawings of smartly dressed men and women named Men in the Cities. Starting to work on it in 1979, these pieces were exhibited two years later at Metro Pictures Gallery in New York and marked the next 35 years of his professional life remaining fresh and current in every period of time. Inspired by the Hollywood’s stylization of violence, in part by the neo-noir cinema of Rainer Werner Fassbinder, rock star poses in music videos and probably the rise of Wall Street his characters are captured in undefined motion that makes the viewer wonder whether they are dancing or dying. The artist described them as “doomed souls. They’re people who built the buildings that would eventually fall on them.” On the roof of his apartment building in lower Manhattan, Longo gathered his friends dressed in suits and photographed them in reactive moments caused by throwing objects toward them. After projecting pictures on paper, he drew over them with a great precision. Radiating youthful optimism, these artworks became a symbol of every new generation.
These characters are captured in undefined motion that makes the viewer wonder whether they are dancing or dying