Dan Friedman's 'Why Shouldn't I Have Fun All Day' Immerses Us in His Artistry
Modeled after the late artist’s 1970’s residence.
Dan Friedman’s Why Shouldn’t I Have Fun All Day? marks the first gallery presentation of the late artist’s work since 1994. Staged in Lower Manhattan’s Superhouse, the exhibition arrives in honor of the 30th anniversary of Friedman’s passing in 1995 and is an immersive imagining of the artist’s Washington Square Park residence.
In the late 1970s, Friedman transformed his one-bedroom apartment into what he called “a living sketchbook” for his art, using every surface as a canvas. “I created an extreme caricature of the beautiful modern American home to bring into question our notion of what is a beautiful modern American home,” he stated at the time. The installation emulates the same energy of the pivotal Lower East Side artist’s apartment as documented in his influential 1994 work Radical Modernism.
“I began to live a double life—out at night, meeting non-designers, artists,” Friedman recalled at the outset of the 1980s. “I realized I was having more fun working at night in this other world, this other side of New York City. I thought, ‘Why shouldn’t I have fun all day?’”
Works featured in the exhibition include Friedman’s first folding screen – the spray-painted Basic Screen (1981) – the grass-skirted Wicky Wacky Table (1981) and A Fallen Sky in a Regal Landscape (1985).
Take a closer look at Why Shouldn’t I Have Fun All Day? in the images above and find all exhibition visiting info below.
Superhouse
120 Walker Street, 6R
New York, NY 10013
February 6, 2025 – March 22, 2025
Tuesday – Saturday, 12 p.m. – 6 p.m.
