David Ireland
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Regional Oral History Office University of California The Bancroft Library Berkeley, California David Ireland INSIDE 500 CAPP STREET: AN ORAL HISTORY OF DAVID IRELAND’S HOUSE Interviews Conducted by Suzanne B. Riess in 2001 Copyright © 2003 by The Regents of the University of California Since 1954 the Regional Oral History Office has been interviewing leading participants in or well-placed witnesses to major events in the development of northern California, the West, and the nation. Oral history is a method of collecting historical information through tape-recorded interviews between a narrator with firsthand knowledge of historically significant events and a well-informed interviewer, with the goal of preserving substantive additions to the historical record. The tape recording is transcribed, lightly edited for continuity and clarity, and reviewed by the interviewee. The corrected manuscript is indexed, bound with photographs and illustrative materials, and placed in The Bancroft Library at the University of California, Berkeley, and in other research collections for scholarly use. Because it is primary material, oral history is not intended to present the final, verified, or complete narrative of events. It is a spoken account, offered by the interviewee in response to questioning, and as such it is reflective, partisan, deeply involved, and irreplaceable. ************************************ All uses of this manuscript are covered by a legal agreement between The Regents of the University of California and David Ireland, dated January 15, 2002. The manuscript is thereby made available for research purposes. All literary rights in the manuscript, including the right to publish, are reserved to The Bancroft Library of the University of California, Berkeley. No part of the manuscript may be quoted for publication without the written permission of the Director of The Bancroft Library of the University of California, Berkeley. Requests for permission to quote for publication should be addressed to the Regional Oral History Office, 486 Bancroft Library, Mail Code 6000, University of California, Berkeley 94720-6000, and should include identification of the specific passages to be quoted, anticipated use of the passages, and identification of the user. It is recommended that this oral history be cited as follows: David Ireland, “Inside 500 Capp Street: An Oral History of David Ireland’s House,” an oral history conducted in 2001-2002, by Suzanne B. Riess, Regional Oral History Office, The Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley, 2003. Copy no. ______ Cataloguing information David Ireland (b. 1930) Inside 500 Capp Street: An Oral History of David Ireland’s House. 2003, viii, 150 pp. A digital video oral history with conceptual artist David Ireland that takes place at 500 Capp Street, the house he has restored and which serves as a showplace for his art: background on family and education; Hunter Africa, African influences; acquiring the house, insights into ownership, documenting initial decisions; materials used in making art, concrete, wax, wallpaper, dirt; accumulations of brooms, shoes, hair, air; the dumb balls, demonstrated; collectors and galleries; beliefs about art. Interviewed 2001 by Suzanne B. Riess. Table of Contents--David Ireland INTERVIEW HISTORY i BIOGRAPHICAL INFORMATION iii Interview I September 11th Attack Thoughts 1 David Ireland’s House, 500 Capp Street 4 Concrete, Red, Duchamp 6 Things in the Vitrine, Wax, Wallpaper 8 “La Plume” 13 Dumbballs, Torpedoes, Potatoes 14 Materials, Stones 19 Green Line, and Yves Klein 21 70th Birthday Jars, and Other Jars 24 Buying the House, Taking “Action” 25 Brief History, and New York Years 27 Back to the Walls, and Ceiling 30 Resolution, Exhibition 31 Interview II Family in Bellingham 35 High School Art Class, Small Town 36 Power Places 38 If the Artist Calls it Art 39 Memories of Radio, TV 40 Minorities 41 Handy-ness, Trash Disposal 42 “Angel Go Round” 44 Height, Fame 45 Fathers, Cross-Country Trip 46 “Doing More” With Art 48 More on September 11th and Memorials 49 New York’s Response to David Ireland, 1973 51 Dan Flavin 52 Cy Twombly, Jasper Johns 53 Franz Kline 55 Working with Wire, and Fire 56 Copper Window 59 On and Under the Table 60 Interview III Insurance Work, GI Bill 63 “I Can Do That” 64 Fluxus 65 Concrete 67 Galleries, Art Talk 68 Worrying About the Work 69 Getting Close to the Edge, Paper Towels 71 Originality 72 Art Teachers, Schools 73 The Moving Green Line, Making Changes 75 Knees Cups 78 Dirt 81 Hair, Tumbleweeds 83 IKB, Yves Klein Blue 85 Sparks 86 Brooms, and Wallpaper Patties 87 Looking in the Cabinet 90 Insulation Foam 92 Newspapers, and Attention Art 93 Interview IV Hunter Africa, Influences 95 Discussing Drawing 99 What You Need to Know to Criticize 104 Keeping Personal History Separate 105 Art is Perfect, if You Can See It 106 The Position of the Historian 109 The Camera in the Study 112 Joseph Beuys 113 Reliquary of Friends’ Work 115 Books, Shoes 120 The Camera, on Down the Hall 121 Brooms, Cream Whipper, Peat Piece 125 Interview V Dining Room, Skulls and Wall Pieces 129 Concrete, Unidentified Rocks, Roofing 131 Art Being About Pleasing the Artist 136 Allan Kaprow 137 Challenging the Viewer 138 Seventy-nine for John Cage 141 Words, Mundane, Insincere 142 More on the Teachers 143 Installations, Galleries, the Maintenance Action 145 TAPE GUIDE 149 The David Ireland interview was conducted in partnership with the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art and was made possible by a generous grant from the Koret Foundation. i INTERVIEW HISTORY--David Ireland In July 2001 San Francisco Museum of Modern Art president Richard L. Greene got in touch with the Regional Oral History Office about his wish to have us undertake an oral history of David Ireland's house. House? What the museum wanted was not-your-ordinary oral history. Rather than setting out to do an oral account of a life, marching through the chronology of birth, education, and work, the subject of the interview would be a house, 500 Capp Street, San Francisco. David Ireland's house, his embodiment, his "action." I needed to make myself acquainted with David Ireland’s work. A file of pieces explaining, defining, the art of David Ireland was supplied me by Greene, and gallery owner Paule Anglim. Most helpful were Karen Tsugimoto's "A Decade Documented, 1978-1988" to accompany an exhibition in the University of California's Matrix Gallery; Bill Berkson's cleverly titled "David Ireland's Accommodations" in the September 1989 Art in America; Maine College of Art Institute of Contemporary Art curator and director Jennifer Gross's 1997 essay contextualizing an Ireland installation at MECA; Betty Klausner’s essay tackling the Dumbballs in Land Forum. I recommend them all, and look forward to the catalogue for the 2003 David Ireland Retrospective at the Oakland Museum of California where Karen Tsugimoto and Jennifer Gross return to their subject with new insights quoted from the oral history. In August I went to visit David Ireland for an initial meeting, to get an impression of him and of the house, and I left 500 Capp Street that day wildly excited at the prospect of doing the interview, talking about art, whatever that might turn out to be, with David. Conceptual art seemed, indeed, very much to lend itself to talk. But how to deal with the question of description? We would be surrounded by numerous Ireland pieces, on the walls, tables, shelved behind glass--the very room itself was perhaps his most familiar and frequently photographed conceptual work. While description on the part of the interviewee might be necessary and interesting, it would have the awkwardness of describing for a third person, the reader, what was right there in front of the two participant parties, David and myself. Knowing that part of the plan from the point of view of San Francisco MOMA was eventually to have a video that would serve to tour the viewer through the house, as well as the oral history for researchers to read and reference, I decided from the beginning to take both video camera and audio tape recorder, and have both of them set up to record. Thus descriptions are reinforced by the image and the burden was far less on David to put everything into words. 500 Capp Street was perfect for such a visual setup. My wires and cords and tripod merged with the wires and arrangements that supported or powered David's work. The camera's eye, when not on David or on some specific piece under discussion, focused lengthily on sweeps of glazed yellow wall, or slabs of red-painted concrete, or streaks of green marked plywood as the conversation went on about them. The interviews span a period from October 12th to December 12th. The decision was made from the beginning not to take the interviews out of the house--in other words, not to film at sites like the Headlands Center for the Arts where Ireland's commission in 1987 was also about changing historic space. Not to film at Ireland’s Oakland studio and see what goes on in that space. True to our mandate we confined ourselves to the world of 500 Capp Street. To set the scene: I arrive and ring the bell. David answers the door immediately. He has been looking through some mail and papers placed near the front door. I think he has seen me from upstairs when I was parking on his busy Capp Street corner. He is very tall and gracious. He is wearing a dark sweater. He offers tea, and goes back to the kitchen to prepare it. I take the various recorders, my stack of research and ii interview notes, my camera bag and tripod upstairs.