{"data":{"id":"11512","type":"artwork","attributes":{"id":11512,"topgoose_id":3491,"portfolio_id":null,"tms_id":11512,"title":"Ghoster","display_artist_text":"Gary Simmons","display_date":"1996","accession_number":"97.100","dimensions":"Dimensions variable","medium":"Chalkboard paint and chalk on wall","department":"collection","classification":"Installations","credit_line":"Purchase, with funds from the Contemporary Painting and Sculpture Committee","is_virtual":false,"is_portfolio":false,"portfolio_tms_id":null,"portfolio":null,"edition":null,"publication_info":"","description":"\u003cp\u003eGary Simmons, \u003cem\u003eGhoster\u003c/em\u003e, 1996. Chalkboard paint and chalk on wall, dimensions variable. Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; purchase, with funds from the Contemporary Painting and Sculpture Committee 97.100\u003c/p\u003e","object_label":"\u003cp\u003eGary Simmons’s \u003ci\u003eGhoster\u003c/i\u003e—a roller coaster drawn with chalk on a blackboard-like surface—is ghostly, silent, and still. Like all of the works in this series, which is entitled \u003ci\u003eErasure Drawings\u003c/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eGhoster\u003c/i\u003e is partially erased, as if in preparation for the next day’s lesson, or as if the image were an expression of a faded memory. The \u003ci\u003eErasure Drawings\u003c/i\u003e were inspired, in part, by the abandoned blackboards Simmons found in an old schoolhouse where he had a studio in the late 1980s. Many of the initial drawings featured racially typecast cartoon characters. “I wanted to show how we can attempt to erase a stereotype, but the image won’t easily go away. It persists,” says Simmons. Many subsequent \u003ci\u003eErasure Drawings\u003c/i\u003e have depicted images of violence or loss—a shipwreck, a vacant throne, and an empty ballroom lit by an ornate chandelier, which close inspection reveals, is made up of spinning nooses.\u003c/p\u003e","ai_alt_text":"Large gray and white abstract mural resembling a delicate architectural framework hangs on a gallery wall.","alt_text":null,"visual_description":null,"on_view":false,"created_at":"2017-08-30T15:45:57.000-04:00","updated_at":"2026-02-06T11:59:38.771-05:00","images":[{"id":102302,"url":"https://whitneymedia.org/assets/artwork/11512/97_100a-d_cropped.jpg"}]},"relationships":{"artists":{"data":[{"id":"3913","type":"artist"}]}}}}