This is part of a press kit I helped create with a group in my Writing for Public Relations class.

2. 1900
roughout the rst two decades of the
twentieth century, Blue Man Group de-
velops new material at places like Dixon
Place, Performance Space 122 and on the
Vaudeville circuit. ey appear several
times on the same bill as the young Marx
Brothers. One of Blue Man Group’s piec-
es, called “Shadows,” is the inspiration
for the classic mirror scene in the Marx
Brothers’ lm Duck Soup.
1857
Jean-Francois Millet paints Blue
Man Group while they use a fun-
nelator slingshot to cast paint bal- 1990
In the 90s, the story of Blue Man Group’s
loons against an abandoned barn.
in uence on modern art is being told for
e Blue Men come out disap-
the rst time. Many of the pieces men-
pointingly small on canvas and not tioned here are on display in the lobby
properly centered. Millet remedies gallery of the Briar Street eatre in Chi-
the situation by adding peasants cago.
to the foreground, thereby balanc-
ing the composition. No one had
ever painted peasants in the “grand
style” before this piece, which he
calls e Gleaners. e painting
causes a scandal and Millet cata-
lyzes a revolution in artistic subject
matter.
1960
When Yves Klein gives Blue Man Group
a tour of his studio, one of the Blue Men
accidently brushes against a blank can-
vas leaving behind a blue smudge. Klein
writes: “When I saw the Blue Man’s
smudge on my canvas I thought - at
last, the life force transmitted directly
to a painting, unmediated by the artist’s
hand!” Klein explores this idea further,
leading to his infamous Anthropometry
series, where he paints his subjects and
then presses or drags them against large
white canvases.