Copyright by Alexander Blair Dumbadze 2005
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Copyright by Alexander Blair Dumbadze 2005 The Dissertation Committee for Alexander Blair Dumbadze certifies that this is the approved version of the following dissertation: How Images Became Text in Contemporary American Art Committee: ———————————————— Richard Shiff, Supervisor ———————————————— Linda Henderson ———————————————— Michael Charlesworth ———————————————— Ann Reynolds ———————————————— Kathleen Higgins ———————————————— John Clarke How Images Became Texts in Contemporary American Art by Alexander Blair Dumbadze, A.B.; M.A. Dissertation Presented to the Faculty of the Graduate School of the University of Texas at Austin in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy The University of Texas at Austin August 2005 To my Grandfathers Here I am, trying to give an account of something, and as soon as I pause I realize that I have not yet said anything at all. Elias Canetti Acknowledgements Almost since the beginning of this dissertation, I’ve thought about how I would thank everyone who helped make it possible. Needless to say, as I now sit down to write, it’s far more difficult than I ever imagined—some things simply evade words. Still, I think I can muster something, but I’m afraid that what I’ll say will fail to fully express my gratitude. This project began over a cup of coffee with my advisor Richard Shiff in the summer of 2000. It was then that he suggested that I should investigate the presence of written information in contemporary art. For this, I thank him. But where real thanks are due is how he guided me throughout graduate school. I could not have asked for a better experience, or a better person under which to study. The two years spent as his research and teaching assistant were the most important of my education. Here I not only learned what it meant to be a scholar in the truest sense of the word, but I also was shown how to do things with integrity, individuality, and intellectual rigor. I cannot imagine a better lesson to impart on one’s student, and for this I am deeply indebted. The majority of research for this dissertation occurred in New York, where I’ve lived since the summer of 2001. Countless hours and days were spent at the New York Public Library, the Avery Library at Columbia University, the Museum of Modern Art Library, and the Hunter College Library. I would like to thank the staffs of each of these institutions for their assistance. vi The first year of my research was aided by a University of Texas Continuing Fellowship. The subsequent three years I spent teaching in the Department of Art at Hunter College, City University of New York. I want to thank Katy Siegel for not only her intellectual support, but for helping me get the job at Hunter. I would also like to thank at Hunter Sandy Wurmfeld, Dick Stapleford, and Bill Agee. Special thanks are reserved for my students. Over the past three years you have heard every aspect of this dissertation. Your comments and insights were invaluable. It was an absolute privilege being your teacher, and I hope you learned as much from me as I did from you. I have also greatly benefited from conversations with several people. When I first moved to New York I had the opportunity to spend time with Joachim Pissarro. Our numerous discussions not only helped shape my ideas, but also pushed me to reconsider previously held assumptions. In this regard I would also like to thank Jean-Claude Lebensztejn. During the past several years when we haven’t seen each other in Paris or New York, we have corresponded regularly and exchanged essays. His generosity with his time, his striking insights, and the uniqueness of his work is a source of tremendous admiration. But none of this would have been possible without the many long talks I’ve had with Rob Rush. There is no one I’d rather discuss things with than him. He is the imaginary reader I have in mind when I write. And I am always trying to answer his skeptical, probing questions before he even asks them. Rob… Cheers. My mother, father, and brother have been an incredible source of support throughout this entire process. They never wavered in their encouragement, and vii were always there when I needed them. I don’t think I ever tell them enough how much they mean to me. Needless to say, I am incredibly lucky, and a simple thank you seems inadequate, but Mom, Dad, Peter: Thank you. Donald Judd features somewhat prominently in this dissertation, and as chance would have it, I happened upon a Judd show at Paula Cooper Gallery. It was here, almost three years ago to the day, that I met my fiancé, Simone, who truly enabled me to see this project through to the end. Simone was always the instant elixir to dissertation induced malaise. Her belief, her love, her commitment is remarkable. Bumsti meine Süße, it’s so big… Danke für alles. This last thank you is one that can only occur in writing. It’s to two men who did not live to see me write this, or enter graduate school, or even attend college. They both died before I turned sixteen. But although I knew them for a relatively short time, they left an indelible impression on me. Both wanted to be academics. Both had life get in the way. I am honored to be able to do what I do, and I would not have had this opportunity without the many sacrifices they made. I dedicate this dissertation to my grandfathers, for whom I am named: Alexander Dumbadze and Robert Blair Maddox. viii How Images Became Texts in Contemporary American Art Publication No. __________ Alexander Blair Dumbadze, Ph.D. The University of Texas at Austin, 2005 Supervisor: Richard Shiff This dissertation examines how and why written information in a visual context as well as various theories of language (namely poststructuralism) became so influential in contemporary American art. It argues that many artists and writers from the mid 1960s until the late 1980s believed that the use of language would dramatically alter the nature of art. But the converse, in fact, is true. Indeed, the reliance on language facilitated the rapid assimilation of these works (artistic and critical) into the broader fold of the contemporary American art world. What was radical became conventional in no time. How Images Became Texts in Contemporary American Art begins in the early 1960s by describing why a number of Conceptual artists (John Baldessari, Robert Barry, Douglas Huebler, Joseph Kosuth, and Lawrence Weiner) gave up painting in order to work with ix written information. Part of this explanation derives from their reaction to the work of Donald Judd and Frank Stella. From here this investigation shows how in the late 1970s and early 1980s a select group of progressive art critics (primarily Hal Foster and Craig Owens) began to react against some of the aesthetic consequences generated, in part, from the linguistic endeavors initiated by the Conceptualists mentioned above. There was a concern shared by Foster and Owens that the situation known pejoratively as Pluralism was out of control. In order to redress this development they imbued their writing with numerous references and allusions to such poststructuralist philosophers as Roland Barthes, Jacques Derrida, and Michel Foucault. This had the effect of producing a body of literature that emphasized linguistic analysis of visual objects. It also neatly coincided with the continued use of written information by such artists as Barbara Kruger and Jenny Holzer, which made it possible to see that by the spring of 1988, images, at least rhetorically, had become texts. x Contents Chapter 1 1 Chapter 2 14 Chapter 3 51 Chapter 4 116 Figures 175 Bibliography 198 Vita 217 xi Chapter 1: In the spring of 1988 the critic Robert Pincus-Witten observed that in New York, “the contemporary work of art was to be, before all else, a text.”1 This is a curious claim. It seems, at first glance, counterintuitive. Why would something presumably visual be thought of in terms of something to be read or, at the very least, something literary? Are they not two separate qualities? Is it wrong to assume that they are incommensurable? Perhaps they are closer than one might think. Maybe a change has occurred in what people believe about art. Then if so, why? * * * In the spring of 2005 there is no problem with a work of art containing written information. Words are everywhere. They are on the wall. They are in paintings, in drawings, in photographs, in installations, in videos, in films. Where there is art there is always a chance of having something to read. And most seem comfortable with this possibility. But this relative comfort does not mean that today the use of language is the dominant idiom out there. It is just another feature that crops up regularly—similar to figuration, or abstraction, or any other formal or technical device an artist uses to express their intentions. It 1 Robert Pincus-Witten, “Entries: Concentrated Juice & Kitschy Kitschy Koons,” Art Magazine 63, no. 6 (February 1989): 34. Although the article was published in February 1989, there are entries that date back to 1986. It is hard to know whether the entries are actually from the time he says. Most likely, they are. Even still, there is enough contextual evidence in the entries to make them, at the very least, reflective of that particular moment. 1 was not always this way, however. Conventions have origins. The presence of written information goes back quite a way—about forty years to be exact.