A Bird Always Builds a Nest in His House
Mike Kelley
American, 1954–2012
1978
A felt‑tip pen on lined paper where Mike Kelley transforms a private notebook note into a deadpan, instructional sketch—handwritten aphorism and a simple drawing of a house, a nest, and a falling egg that mix folk wisdom with dark humor.
The page hits you with bold, blocky handwriting and a childlike sketch: a funnel‑shaped house with a roughly drawn nest labeled “THE NEST,” an arrow and the blunt caption “AN EGG COULD FALL,” all on a torn spiral‑edge sheet that feels improvised and intimate.
The work shows Kelley mining everyday writing and schoolroom aesthetics to collapse private notes, vernacular diagrams, and conceptual irony into art, helping legitimize personal ephemera and instructional language as material for contemporary practice.
Medium
Felt-tip pen on lined paper
Dimensions
9 1/2 × 6" (24.1 × 15.2 cm)
Classification
Department
Credit
Gift of the Gilbert B. and Lila Silverman Instruction Drawing Collection, Detroit
Accession
1479.2018
Palette
Art Terms
Exhibitions
