His earliest works took place in the street, starting with his “Crawl” series in 1978, in which Pope.L moved on his hands and feet through the streets of New York City. For “Eating the Wall Street Journal” in 1991, he ate pages of the Wall Street Journal, washing them down with milk and ketchup. For another performance piece, Pope.L sat in the window of Franklin Furnace, an arts organization in New York City, offering himself as a commodity.
“Pope.L was the kindest person I have ever met,” said Veronica Vegna, senior instructional professor in the Department of Romance Languages and Literatures and the College at UChicago. “He was critical of many things through his artwork, and yet I have never heard him make a single negative remark about anybody. He would listen without being judgmental. He would talk without any presumption. Among other things, I have always admired his curiosity and desire to critically understand. With his remarkable determination came great patience. He was and will always be Pope.L.”
Among his many grants and awards, he received the VIA Art Fund Grant, Guggenheim fellowship, and National Endowment for the Arts fellowship. Pope.L was represented by the galleries of Mitchell-Innes & Nash in New York City and Susanne Vielmetter in Los Angeles, as well as Modern Art in London. His work was included in the 2002 and 2017 Whitney Biennials; during the latter he received the Whitney’s coveted Bucksbaum Award. Pope.L’s work also appeared in 2017 as part of “Documenta 14” in Athens and Kassel, Germany.
A deeply committed teacher
Over the past decade, Pope.L’s art was frequently visible across UChicago’s campus, including solo exhibitions at the Renaissance Society in 2013 (Forlesen) and the Logan Center for the Arts in 2017 (Brown People Are The Wrens in the Parking Lot). A major permanent mural entitled Cliff was installed on the eighth floor of the Logan Center in 2012.
During 2024, UChicago’s Gray Center for Arts and Inquiry will dedicate a special issue of its journal Portable Gray—the name coined by Pope.L himself—to the artist’s life and work.
“Pope.L was one of the most important artists of this or any century,” said Zachary Cahill, director of Fellowship and Programs at the Gray Center and editor of Portable Gray. “It will take scholars decades to truly unpack the depth and complexity of his work. He was also, without a doubt, one of the greatest teachers I have ever known. Fiercely dedicated to his students, he cared about them in a way that is hard for me to explain. My impression was always that he wasn’t just teaching them for a class or a degree but for their entire life. It was a marvel to behold.”
In a 2021 interview for UChicago Arts, Pope.L discussed why he decided to enter the teaching profession. “Over time, I’ve simplified my teaching philosophy: work, work harder and then work harder still,” he said. “Typically, I create a prompt or a situation within which the student operates. The student makes a proposal for that context, we discuss any obvious issues, then the student responds with their work and the critique become an exploration/discussion of how the student wrestled within that situation and how they can better their approach.”
Before coming to UChicago in 2010, Pope.L was a lecturer in Theater and Rhetoric at Bates College in Lewiston, Maine.
Beloved by many students at UChicago, Pope.L was described as a “deeply committed teacher and mentor,” by his friend Jeremiah Hulsebos-Spofford, associate professor of sculpture at Indiana University Northwest.
“The impact of Pope.L’s creativity, perspective and approach to engaging with the world resonates deeply in my life as an artist and a human being,” said Danny Volk, MFA’14, now assistant curator at the Westmoreland Museum of American Art in Greensburg, Pennsylvania. “These lessons, sometimes hard-earned, have proven to be important and long-lasting gifts.”
Another of Pope.L’s former students, Nisi Daly, MFA’13, said Pope.L changed her life. “Some people are just special,” she said. “So special that they impact lives in a web in every direction. So special that their teachings change worlds. That’s what happened to me through Pope.L’s teaching.”
He is survived by his partner, Mami Takahashi; an older brother, Eugene Pope; and a son, Desmond.
