Allen Memorial Art '£ Museum Bulletin Social St Oberlin College
XLIV, 1,1990
m 4 + 4 M*^VfVi Young Americans ••• •• ••• * • • • • • • •
I i. I > s © 9 I C (0 0) -> -;- -•?«. -If Social Studies: 4 + 4 Young Americans Elizabeth A. Brown Allen Memorial October 26, 1990- Art Museum, January 13, 1991 Oberlin College 24 T «38| 01/35 01-415-00 «>- m Vivienne Koorland. Terezin: Eva, 1990. Oil on paper attached to linen, 52x62!' Collection of the artist; courtesy of Sandra Gering Gallery. Foreword Allen by William J. Chiego Memorial Acknowledgements Art Social Studies: 4 + 4 Young Americans Museum by Elizabeth A. Brown Bulletin Interviews Willie Cole 14 Oberlin College Renee Green 22 Vivienne Koorland 28 XLIV, 1, 1990 Jeanne Silverthorne 36 Group Material 42 Checklist 49 Artist Biographies 50 This project is partly supported by funds from the Ohio Arts Council. Allen Memorial Art Museum Bulletin: Editors: William J. Chiego, Larry J. Feinberg. Designer: Richard Sarian. Printed by Ideal Reproductions, Cleveland, Ohio. Typesetting by LIVE Publishing. Published twice a year by the Allen Memorial Art Museum, Oberlin College, Oberlin, Ohio. $10.00 a year, this issue $5.00; mailed free to members of the Oberlin Friends of Art. Back issues available from the Museum. Indexed in The Art Index and abstracted by RILA (Inter national Repertory of the Literature of Art) and ARTbibliographies. Reproduced on Uni versity Microfilms, Ann Arbor, Mich. (Copyright ° Oberlin College, 1990) ISSN: 0002-5739 Foreword In each instance such group exhibi tions necessarily require a great deal of looking and thinking to discern the sig nificant work being done today and to decide what is important to exhibit at this time. This has certainly been true for the Museum's present Curator of Modern Art, Elizabeth A. Brown, who joined our staff last year. Her first group exhibition for Oberlin is the result of visits with dozens of artists, conversa tions with many colleagues, and much thought. The selection made focuses on a number of artists with related concerns about contemporary society, signified by the exhibition title, although their responses take many different forms. As always, the act of selection is really an act of faith in the artists cho sen. I am grateful to Elizabeth Brown for the energy and passion with which she has tackled this project. I wish also to thank all of the Museum staff mem The opening of this exhibition, "Social bers, and particularly Chief Curator Studies: 4 + 4 Young Americans," is an Larry J. Feinberg, who have helped her important occasion in the life of the accomplish this exhibition and its cata Allen Memorial Art Museum. It revives a logue. With a look back at the past and a tradition established nearly forty years commitment to help define the future, ago, in 1951, when Director Charles she has organized an exhibition that Parkhurst organized the first Young should delight our senses and provoke Americans exhibition to bring to Oberlin discussion and debate about the course exemplary contemporary works that of art in our time. would show what young American art Readers of this catalogue will note ists were doing at that time. Moreover, it that it is a regular number of the Allen is the first such exhibition to be organ Memorial Art Museum Bulletin, follow ized since William dander's' 'New Voices ing the tradition of earlier ' 'Young 4: Women & The Media, New Video" of Americans'' publications. A new design 1984, and reaffirms the Museum's com for our bulletin is inaugurated with this mitment to contemporary art in our issue, and it seems particularly appro exhibition program. priate that we adopt a new look for a The Museum's group exhibitions of study of new work. new talent, organized over the following Lastly, I would like to express the years by Forbes Whiteside, Ellen H. Museum's gratitude to the Horace W Johnson, Athena Tacha Spear, and Goldsmith Foundation for its continued William Olander, have brought a remark support of our program in photography able array of new work to Oberlin. In and contemporary art, and to the Ohio many cases these exhibitions helped to Arts Council for a generous project bring young artists to national attention, grant which has helped us to make this including many now acknowledged as exhibition a reality. major figures of post-war American art, William J. Chiego, Director such as Richard Diebenkorn, Claes Olden burg, Jackie Winsor, and Jenny Holzer. Acknowledgements the contributions of May Castleberry, Russell Ferguson, Tom Finkelpearl, Peter Frank, Amy Hauft, Paul H.O., Caroline Jackson, Greg Little, Ned Rifkin, Andres Serrano, Marilyn Minter, and Eugenie Tsai. Susan Cooke and Shirley R. Brown read and commented on ver sions of the essay. I am also indebted to the faculty of the Art Department for their intellectual input, their enthusi asm, and their encouragement. I espe cially note the contributions of Ellen Johnson, Honorary Curator of Modern Art and Professor Emeritus, Patricia Mathews, Associate Professor of Art, Sarah Schuster, Assistant Professor of Art, and Athena Tacha, Professor of Art. For their assistance in obtaining loans and reproductions, I thank the Christine Burgin Gallery, the Sandra Gering Gallery, Cosimo di Leo Ricatto, Dennis Derryck, and Hans Littmann; Susan Meaders of the Coca-Cola Company, kindly provided This exhibition identifies a new ten photographs of Coke cans. New photog dency in contemporary art, of socially raphy of many works in the exhibition responsive approaches, by demonstrat was ably done by Eddie Watkins. I am ing the range of work created by several deeply indebted to Richard Sarian for emerging artists. To tackle such a project his striking design, as well as for his help requires a great deal of help: logistical, with the production of the catalogue. emotional, and intellectual support. I Throughout this project I have have been very fortunate in my associ enjoyed the support and assistance of ates, on whom I depended throughout the entire staff of the Allen Memorial the conception and execution of this Art Museum. I particularly wish to showing. My greatest thanks go to the thank the Director, William J. Chiego; artists: Doug Ashford, Julie Ault, Willie Anne Moore, Curator of Education, and Cole, Renee Green, Felix Gonzalez-Torres, Corinne Fryle, NEA Intern in Educa Vivienne Koorland, Karen Ramspacher, tion; Scott Carpenter, Preparator, and and Jeanne Silverthorne, for their Elizabeth Wolfe, Intern/Assistant to the effort, their patience, and their warmth. Preparator; Joan-Elisabeth Reid, Regis Throughout the preparation of the exhi trar; Leslie Miller, Special Events and bition, the artists have been extremely Membership Administrator; Marjorie L. generous with their time and knowl Burton, Museum Security Supervisor, edge, working unstintingly to explore and Beatrice Clapp, Administrative their motivation and intentions and Assistant. My deepest gratitude is to reveal the hidden layers of their work. Larry J. Feinberg, Chief Curator, who During the preparation of the exhibi helped me to determine the original tion I depended on colleagues and friends composition of the exhibition, consulted for advice, feedback, and suggestions— on its organization, read and edited particularly about studios to visit and several versions of the essay and the shows to see. Among the many friends interview transcripts, and provided a and colleagues who provided advice and sense of lucidity and focus at every encouragement, I wish to acknowledge stage of this project. E.A.B. Social Studies: 4+4 Ifoung Americans Elizabeth A. Brown Diverse in iconography, form, and with history painting or religious icons. method, the works exhibited in "Social Through research and through a sys Studies: 4+4 Young Americans" share a tematic refining process they create common definition of contemporary art. effective and challenging works that Art today, these works suggest, should manifest their individual concerns seduce viewers in order to engage their within the larger contexts of history minds as well as their emotions. As in and of current events. the past, art today can modify the It is difficult to name a method, a viewers' experience or alter the way subject, or a medium that was not cur they think. To function effectively, this rent during the eighties. But the over work must enlist wide viewer attention whelming effect of the art of the decade or participation. Each object or project was theoretical, distanced, and cool. in this exhibition amuses, or charms, or Building on that practice, the artists in startles; each provokes a strong reaction this exhibition make studious work, but to ensure that it is accessible to all seg they employ theory to approach—not to ments of its audience. The five partici recoil from—personal issues. Despite or pants in' 'Social Studies" —four individual through their conceptual rigor, they artists, Willie Cole, Renee Green, embrace subjectivity and passion, Vivienne Koorland, and Jeanne Silver- excavating internal resources, such as thorne, plus the four members of Group intuition or memory; they uncover the Material, Doug Ashford, Julie Ault, data that have shaped their experiences Felix Gonzalez-Torres, and Karen and their histories. Although there is Ramspacher—address diverse social always a clear and visible link between issues. They tackle weighty subjects, their subjects and the artists' selves, the subjects with the seriousness, complex work is not intended as autobiography. ity, and stature traditionally associated Rather than to narrow meaning, each wound even more acutely than would a artist's goal is to open up her or his sub harsher epithet. She adopted this harsh ject, to suggest new relationships, to simile for language because she was recast a theme with new interpreta deeply aware of its power to hurt. tions, and to draw associations across Silverthorne, who works as a teacher categories or genres. and a critic, insists on theoretical under pinnings, primarily psychoanalytic and Jeanne Silverthorne's art is suspended Feminist, for each development in her between two poles, intuitive or emo art. A distorted (latex-cast) mirror tional responses on the one side, and appears in three versions of the Self- theory on the other. In discussing the Portrait, along with various attributes contradictions in her working process that imply aspects of self image. The and intentions, the artist describes her untitled installation of 1990 (fig. 1) com stance as occupying the isthmus between prises a phalanx of figures, each a synec the right and left lobes of the brain. Min doche for particular notions of woman: ing her preoccupations and insights, she fertility, id, purity, sexual allure. A rub invents quirky, evocative objects that ber frame that seems to hold stretched carry complex meanings. human skin and a rubber banana peel In a similar fashion, Silverthorne's art suggest stress and vulnerability by is at once enticing and repulsive, prompting visceral responses. These ele thought-provoking and laugh-inspiring. ments are intended to represent anxie Her works from 1983 and 1984, modeled ties, which are also aspects of the on prosthetic devices, used common contemporary female stereotype. A lily, words to draw a parallel—conceptually a traditional attribute of the Virgin, and formally—between prostheses and sways on a base that quotes modern language. "Says" is attached to a lower- sculpture. Silverthorne's corroded sur leg prosthesis, " So-So" j uxtaposed to faces and low-art materials contradict dentures, and "Please" applied to a these symbols of traditional and moder leaky hot-water bottle. In one respect, nist purity. The group centers on a large these objects quote Jasper Johns, partic cast figure (detail, fig. 15), partly in ularly his early definition of teeth as the spired by the Venus of Willendorf, made essential attribute of the critic and his of grotesque heaps of flesh in order to later employment of partial body casts reflect distorted notions of sexuality as pictorial elements. The blunt presen and appearing flayed to adumbrate tation of these objects, combined with anxieties about being overexposed and their strange colors, evoke a sense of the unprotected. Our interpretation of the ridiculous rather than the sublime; figure and of all the components oscil there is a personal edge to these refer lates between tragedy and slapstick; for ences that separates Silverthorne's work instance, the scale is serious, but the from eighties appropriation art. Pros lime green patina is not. thetic devices provide aid yet intensify Willie Cole's work skirts dangerously our sense of loss. In her early works the close to the naive. In reproduction it is artist tried to assert that words could be further hampered by its ostensible seen in the same way: representing the humor. The works are funny, but con lack of something more real than lan fronted face to face, they are also fierce. guage and therefore as harmful as they They tread the line between comic and are helpful. If "Says," as in, "this frightening, a fluid border much trans authority says such and such," replaces gressed by serious art in the twentieth the interlocutor's more authentic century, when it takes on sacred or response, then language can indeed tragic subjects without the realism that function as a crutch. "So-So," uttered set the emotional tone for earlier art. by a critic about new work, could Figure 1: Cole creates masks and figures that work never slips into mere cleverness. Jeanne quote non-Western art sources out of He pushes himself beyond predictable Silverthorne. Untitled common, discarded, American house associations or compositions, revealing a installation, hold appliances: telephones, irons, and spiritual power in the objects that finds 1989. Hydro- blowdryers. Maintaining recognizable its parallel in Senufo or Yoruba sources. stone, hydro- cal, rubber, features of his catalyst object and Cole further tests each work in the stu silk, metal, preserving the patina of use, of corro dio for a few weeks to see how well it and wheels, sion, and of dirt that it has acquired, holds up. Successful compositions often a 70x109 x90". Cole allows the original character of his spin off into further series. If he discov Collection of source to contribute aspects of meaning ers limitations in an object, he dissects it the artist; to the new work. and reuses the parts in another way. One courtesy of area of his studio, cluttered with partial Christine Cole describes the stages of his work Burgin ing process in spiritual terms, beginning compositions—heads, legs, and torsos Gallery. with his discovery of a catalyst object— arranged on a shelf awaiting the rest of ' 'it finds me,'' he says. He then locates their body—recalls in spirit the cabinet enough similar objects, whether appli of plaster body parts in Auguste Rodin's ances, industrial components, or car Paris studio. parts, to begin constructing a series. Determining how to present these Experimentation follows. Cole likens the objects is the final stage of Cole's proc assembling process to play; he tries every ess. Sometimes he creates an installa combination he can visualize, then forces tion, sometimes he transforms or merges himself to find a second creative wind, individual works. Having fabricated and sometimes a third, as he develops several series of masks, each with the further compositions. The artist is potential for some action, he now envi intensely committed to discovering the sions performances: dancers wearing spirit of his subject. That focus and his the telephone heads and cloaked in gar dedication to linking the iconography of ments composed of telephone bells, his objects to the function of the appli moving to the sounds of rings, tones, and ances he reassembles, ensure that the beeps; another group bearing the blow- The Great Gatsby. Her subject in these dryer masks performing to a concert of works is the perverse norm, the every the sounds a blow dryer can produce. day attitudes we have absorbed and the Each such stage of the artist's process behaviors they might spark. By reposi concentrates the energy of his work and tioning strategic quotations "in the vis deepens its impact. The extant objects ual field," by displaying these strings of have already been endowed with some words on panels or on quasi-architectural of their appropriate attributes: the tele objects, she is able to reverse their func phones blink their lights; the irons are tion. Presented in this manner, fixed on frequently shown with African-type a panel or in a museum case, the rhet textiles behind them, created by repeat oric itself becomes the object of—rather edly scorching a canvas, using the base than the vehicle for—scrutiny. of an iron as a brand. The blow dryers Green uses pictorial and installation breathe portentously into the gallery formats to unify her varied skills, tem where they are installed. perament, and interests. She exploits Cole frames his intentions in spiritual her editorial work experience in the terms, but also recognizes a host of inception of a work, in the genesis and related issues, including the search for development of its concept, and in the an African-American identity and details of its presentation (the checklist community, the controversies over for her exhibition at the Clocktower pro ' 'salvage'' attitudes toward ethnographic vided footnotes for each quotation in research, the interest in ecological the pieces rather than information issues and recycling, a modern need for about their physical media). Training new icons, and the phenomenon of her focus on the larger picture, she contemporary materialism. Out of this explores history to encapsulate the sen background he achieves inviting work sations, reactions, and complications that stands up to repeated viewing, of her personal experiences as a Black conjuring up such issues lightly and woman in late twentieth-century convincingly. America. Among the extraordinary Renee Green begins her process by examples she found are Edmund reading and browsing in book stores, as Laforest, so frustrated by his marginal she describes the process, ' 'seeing what position in mainstream French litera catches my eye.'' She draws most of her ture that he drowned himself, a Larousse subjects from the historical receptions dictionary tied around his neck as bal of Blacks, particularly women of Afri last, and Aime Cesaire, who created the can descent. Both the histories she negritude movement in literature, presents and the ways she uses them which combined Martinique patois, clas have a literary focus or twist. Like Cole, sic French, ancient Latin, and neolo she introduces cogent elements of Afri gisms. Concentrating next on women, can history into a wider frame of refer she found her ideal subject in the short ence. Like Silverthorne, Green has a history of the Khoi-Khoi woman Sara particular take on words; she is intrigued Bartman, known as the Hottentot Venus. by the way language has been used (and Green researched the Hottentot is still used) to enforce interpretation. Venus and quotes the secondary docu The examples she finds in literature and ments she found in a series of works scientific reports are occasionally subtle— that she created in 1989. Reports and where nuances of phrasing indicate the journals by such nineteenth-century writer's beliefs about people of color- scientists as Francis Galton, Charles but more often startlingly blunt, as in Darwin's nephew, yielded telling quota the racist passages she quotes from tions that cloak the writer's untoward early twentieth-century novels such as curiosity with a thin veneer of scientific empiricism. Green's installation piece, Figure 2: Sa Main Charmante (fig. 10), functions present literary accounts of black/white ReneeGreen. as a sort of memorial to Bartman, replete oppositions, No Color/Color! and Which? Detail of Which?, with literary accounts of her experience, (fig. 8, detail, fig. 2); three others align 1990. Pho images of the deceased, and an architec groups of samples with more or less tostats and tural construct halfway between a side tendentious color names (fig. 9). Color photocopies on acetate, show platform and an instrument of tor theories, as taught in art schools every vinyl tape, ture. The installation comprises four ele where, permit another examination of glass fish- ments: a ladder of horizontal slats of ingrained biases. She juxtaposes Bau- bowls and water on wood, bearing texts, that hangs down haus texts with fiction or simply pairs wood, the wall beginning at approximately the strings of opposed adjectives, arranging 96x30x9'.' height of a person; a wooden box with words in stark. Minimal compositions Collection of footprints to suggest the way that Bart the artist. that set up her points of view. man was displayed; a peepbox; and a Vivienne Koorland, the only painter spotlight, which glares at viewers when in the group, is engrossed in and emo they crouch to peer inside. Inside is a tionally bound up with her subject mat copy of the nineteenth-century engrav ter, which she finds and refines, like ing that demonstrates the ' 'peculiar'' Green, through historical sources. Instead aspects of the woman's anatomy. The of quoting the telling anecdote, Koorland spaces that the work delineates, the seeks to uncover and recuperate relics, postures that a viewer must assume, and usually ephemeral marks on crumbling the implied placement of the absent paper: little drawings, letters, brittle subject direct viewer empathy. books, old postcards. She researches, From her exploration of issues con selects, and re-presents to her audience cerning skin pigmentation, Green such artifacts as a drawing by a Jewish branched out into associated meanings child of the Terezin (Czechoslovakia) of the word "color." In the Color pieces ghetto and a letter a French Christian she presents "color" in its technical child wrote to God on behalf of her sense, subtly calling up the metaphori father, who had been deported to the cal uses of the word. Two of the series concentration camps in Eastern Europe. 10 Employing her sources formally, even Many of these represent or indicate one when they are primarily or purely words, of three specific areas: the Holocaust; Koorland constructs heavy palimpsests other aspects of Germany, including its of paper, paint, and tar that reflect her lofty culture—Biichner and Beethoven— extended working process. and its military activities in the world Works from 1989, such as Self Portrait wars; and the aftermath of more recent in Heaven (fig. 13), include visual quota genocides. tions of both images and texts. Two of In her most recent works, a series the four panels frame replicas of a draw based on drawings made by children in ing made in Auschwitz in 1943, in which the Terezin ghetto, Koorland cedes the appears a signpost bearing the legend entire composition to her sources. "To Freedom" ("Zur Freiheit" in the Instead of including or quoting these original). The surface of each panel is objects, as she had done in the past, she heavily worked, primarily in black, as now recreates these fragile artifacts in if to eradicate what lay beneath- layered oils and other media on the scale older paintings that Koorland found of serious paintings (fig. 11). These poly dispensible—and to unify these dis chrome sources permit her to reintro parate parts. Curling leaves modeled duce vivid color into her palette. At a in tar wreathe three of the panels, scale somewhat larger than most easel asserting the separate identity of each paintings and in these assertive materi canvas. The more narrative and hori als Koorland's found images assume a zontal Take Me: Holiday Time in Cape forceful presence and a new, indepen Town in the Twentieth Century (fig. 12) dent function. was also constructed on top of rejected Group Material tackles big themes earlier works. Koorland combined three of social importance, chosen by their panels and hid the seams with brown- link to a site, be they of local, national, edged sheets torn from old books, creat or global scale. The essential component ing a surface that appears continuous of their artistic process is organization- despite the tripartite division of the selection and realization—as in organiz upper edge of the canvas. ing an exhibition, organizing responses, Like Green, Koorland researches her organizing a program of actions. Their subjects in archives and accounts of the multi-part, complex work takes on a last century or so, but she focuses on variety of formats, working in space as extremes rather than normative behavior well as on wall surfaces, and often incor (however bizarre or horrific that norm porating changes cumulatively over might be). Her personal connections to time as well. Many of their installations her subjects are slightly less evident are constructed precisely like more tra than Green's: Koorland's mother sur ditional exhibitions: they choose or vived the Lodz ghetto; her father was accept a variety of objects from several deeply interested in these issues of lenders/makers and install them in a extremes and of survivors too; and meaningful way in a space that is acces Koorland grew up in South Africa and sible to a variety of spectators. These studied in Germany, with all the inher objects might be literary or informative ent conflicts and contradictions of both texts, videos, art by such well-known places marking her frames of reference. artists as Barbara Kruger or Joseph Again like Green, Koorland begins her Beuys, works by schoolchildren, or work by researching, accumulating objects of manufacture, such as a May images, quotations, clippings, or graphic tag washer and dryer or laundry soap traces on brittle paper preserved some packaging. They have staged other how from decades and generations ago. projects in public, non-art spaces. Sub culture, for example, involved the instal lation of ad-sized paintings and graphics 11 Figure 3: in the New York subways. By taking input from other organizations, as in Group advantage of specific qualities of the their recent project with the Randolph Material. Education venue, from its significance to its Street Gallery in Chicago. and Democ shape—in that case, the confusion The Oberlin project represents a new racy, detail. between art objects and subway ads, as departure for Group Material. In their Installation a I Din Art well as the populist implications of participation in "Social Studies," they Foundation, installing art in public transportation- are hoping to involve a large portion of New York. Group Material makes form and context their eventual audience. Having spoken September 14-October contribute to meaning, so that their publicly in Oberlin on September 6 to 8, 1988. installations function like more conven sketch their history, explain their work tional works of art. ing process, and survey various current The artists who now constitute Group types of artistic collaboration, they Material work jointly, sharing all stages invited anyone in the auditorium to par of planning and realizing a project, ticipate actively in the project. This bouncing ideas off one another, and initiated a process of soliciting area col making all decisions as a group. By sub laboration and organizing the participa merging individual concerns in the col tion of a large slice of the community, laborative process they resist the notion including around fifty active co-workers of an artistic career. Their partnership from the local audience and many more also calls into question such art-world interested in indirect or short-term criteria as individual genius, originality, cooperation. Discussions conducted like and objectivity. Their work almost a town meeting, which followed the lec always extends into a larger process in ture on September 6, yielded the range which Group Material works collectively of issues important to the community; with other artists or groups, either by the general format that the three including components made by other projects will assume was determined at hands or by incorporating conceptual 12 a second meeting the following day: preparation of this catalogue. Although video, performance, and a mosaic-like none of the work included in this show visual presentation. As in their earlier yet falls under the ' 'forbidden catego work, Group Material has gathered ries,' ' each of these artists feels conflict several related issues under an umbrella ing pressures, to conform to and to theme, here, Economics. The conflicting challenge the status quo. To resist this opinions intrinsic to any collective effort climate, these artists push themselves are incorporated into the working proc generally to take on difficult or unpopu ess as one of its essential components. lar subjects. Their works demonstrate Each project comprises multiple ele that iconography is multivalent and that ments, created by myriad different art interpretation is ambiguous, that art ists; each is further designed to elicit cannot be reduced to a simple formula ideas, quotations, or art from other indi tion. Yet they all strive to make their viduals. The video project, for example, complex art widely accessibile, through is designed by a group of around fifteen verbal texts, humor, formal beauty, or community and college participants, recognizability. Whereas different who are interviewing many other peo works address specific concerns held by ple on camera: both interviewers and one or another segment of the audience, interviewees contribute to the creation each artist tries to make those issues of the final project. Such details as legible to others, targeting every viewer where these projects will be presented, on some level. how they will be constructed, and what The artists and the works in "Social they will try to say are still evolving at Studies" were chosen because they had this writing. something to say to each other and to say, together, to the viewer. They all In the following pages, the exhibition assert the continued power of art—of participants speak for themselves via painting, of installation, of sculpture, abridged interview transcripts. Certain and of electronic media—to create threads run through these discussions. affect, to carry ideas, and to alter expe There is a preoccupation with imme rience—to change the way we think. diacy. The artists tackle raw feelings that provoke empathy or recognition. They incorporate and allude to quotid ian processes, such as research, play, or public debate, in the physical objects they create. Recognizable or familiar motifs are always visible, because each artist either preserves legible sources or incorporates real objects into his, her, or their work. All of the artists feel a heavy legacy of the Reagan years. They are conscious of divisions between social groups, par ticularly in New York, which they try to combat by seeking multiple audiences from various strata of society. Further more, they all feel the weight of the NEA controversy, which has been par ticularly virulent and evident during the 13 .V s* a^^^f*^ - -'•~*3^,,; 4gh |s«p%«;;, Willie Cole Figure 4: Brown: You seem to work serially, want more. I somehow always find Willie Cole. especially in the works made from irons them; I don't buy many things at all. The Steamers, 1989. Steam and this latest group of heads created biggest find that I made was the discov irons, 201/2 out of blow-dryers. Do the different ery of a factory near here where I go xl0x6". forms within a series carry different maybe once a month. But I think I have Collection of the artist. meanings? exhausted the factory. Cole: I see the blow-dryers as wind Brown: That was the blow-dryer masks (figs. 5, 6) or wind spirits, so I felt factory? they needed something that suggests Cole: Yes. There is not too much else in wind. All the pieces within a group com there for me. municate the same energy. The flow of Brown: Are you concerned with the the original object is processed differ work carrying specific meanings, ently through each piece. For example, whether or not it is figurative? some of the masks appear to have Cole: Yes. I like to tap into what I call puffed cheeks, as if they were holding the spirit in the object: the irons were the wind. Others release the wind about heat, so the element in the iron through gills, like a fish filtering water. was fire, so I wanted them to suggest I'm still looking for other variations. fire. That is how the scorches came Brown: How do you choose which mate about. And with the blow-dryers, it is rial to work with? wind. Cole: I usually have something here Brown: That implies that you are going already that inspires me. I don't go out to go on to the other two elements. looking for things on a regular basis, but Cole: Well I have some earth downstairs, I walk a lot. I walk from here [the studio some paintings made from earth I am in Newark's industrial district] to Penn thinking about water, but not sure what Station every day and there's a lot on I will do yet. that street. I find something and it inspires me and then I will decide that I 15 Figure 5: Brown: Will that depend on finding Then I have people come by like yourself Willie Cole. something, some related object? and I notice what things they look at. Wind Mask: South II, Cole: Yes, that could well be the inspira Brown: What criteria are there besides 1990. tion for it. Or the catalyst for it. the work pulling a viewer in and the Blow-dryers, Brown: Once you have the catalyst, work holding up for you? 20x20x 111/4". how do you proceed? Cole: I like the work to look somewhat Collection Cole: By playing. There are parts from ritualistic. I like it not to look like a of Klaus something else. I have so many of them brand new object. Not to look so much Littmann, courtesy of they become like toys and I can sit here like a made object but to look like it has the artist. and try them all different ways, connect a function, whether it is a mechanical or them, and see what happens. Most things a spiritual function. I don't like it to look come about that way. Like Tinker toys. decorative. Brown: How do you know when it has Brown: It's important that they look gotten past that level to a different level? old, like they have been used? Cole: If it survives in the studio more Cole: Yes. I think that if you buy an than two weeks usually. I take a lot of object—a blow-dryer or stapler or any things apart; I abandon a lot of works. 16 thing—and you use it for a few years, Figure 6: you become kind of dependent on it. So there's a world culture. All of these Willie Cole. the object obtains a life from that: it has blow-dryer masks, to me, are somewhat Wind Mask: North II, a memory. When you throw it away, it is Tibetan. The wheel to me is a mandala 1990. Blow- still out there remembering its past. So I and the hum of the motor is a chant. I dryers, 22 x bring it here to turn it into art. I still like made it and I use it in that way. At the 22x19". Collection to keep the memory of the object, the point it was completed in the studio I sat of Klaus integrity of the object. That's why I in the middle of it and got involved in Littmann, don't paint things. the chant of it, and it is a mandala for courtesy of the artist. Brown: How do you want them to clean air. function? Brown: One of the things that is so Cole: I want them to be links between interesting is how the work unites worlds, if that doesn't sound too hokey. several different concerns, such as an You live here in the U.S., but here is a interest in a variety of cultures, in piece of art that looks like it's from materialism and the fetishistic use of another culture and another time, even objects. It also seems to involve issues though the materials in the work are of ecology and the accumulation of strictly American. That shows that garbage. 17 Cole: Yes, well all of that is deliberate. will ever know the truth. In my imagina The first appearance of it was just some tion, that's what I'm doing. I sometimes thing that just happened. Things come think of it as archaeological ethnographic out of you sometimes. Once you realize Dada. I go into this factory down here what is coming out you say, hey, I'm and feel like Indiana Jones. Boy, if you going to keep that and that's going to be were a little kid, you would go in this deliberate. So now it is natural, not a place and have a ball, that kind of feel forced thing to give that impression but ing. Then when I find something, I can it just happens [that] combining fetish relate it to a particular culture and then and materialism is a product of living in make a joke about it and transform it the U.S.. The term fetish being applied into what might be called a work of art. to African culture and... Brown: What are you using to make Brown:... carries multiple meanings? these kinds of processes part of the Cole: Yes, but here it's really the same meaning of the work? thing. Cole: I feel that I am finding relics from Brown: Where do you find your sources? the tribe. Cole: I have a very good friend who is a Brown: Some seem to be relics from dealer of African art, and... I visit him rituals. and I think that's where my big interest Cole: I could say that I look for that in in African art came from because in his the pieces, but it would be more correct studio I can actually touch the pieces to say that if I am walking down the and talk about them. He has taught me a street and there is a piece there that has lot in terms of how to identify styles. the right feel... it is like the piece is Brown: And how to tell how they looking for me. Really, it amazes me. functioned? Brown: Is every part of an assembled Cole: Well, most of the African art piece iconographically related to the objects that are selling now are not sold object? because of their function, but I know Cole: Yes, as often as possible. I like to from reading that they are vessels of find things that are related. power. I studied Eastern culture in col Brown: So the telephone heads are lege to a degree, so I guess that's coming about speech or communication? into play also. Rediscovering Joseph Cole: I guess they are about that because Campbell has been very inspiring. And they're telephones. But I don't like tele discovering the link of mythology or reli phones. Each of those faces, I have gion through various cultures. When I experienced them when the phone rings was a kid, my family was very Christian, too much. So they are all expressing atti Baptist. I believed that 100 percent tudes about the telephone. probably until I was about twenty-five Brown: Steamers (fig. 4) is a very years old. aggressive piece, isn't it? The pose, the Brown: Do you feel that you are making expression... a comparison between that mythologi Cole: I like that one a lot because it is cal structure and mythology of other the first piece that involved more than cultures? one iron. Most pieces involved only one. Cole: I feel that I'm creating a new [And Neo-Senufo (fig. 7)] is integrated mythology. I know that this will never materials, it's not all iron parts. happen, but let's imagine that every Brown: What else is there? thing was destroyed and a new race or a Cole: This part is iron, but the rest are new group of beings came to our planet just mixed things that I found. These and they tried to discover our culture relate to heat. And the design comes through the things that were left, and from a Senufo mask. they find my works of art. So I have totally changed everything and nobody 18 Brown: Have you continued to make I don't mind that, it is humorous to me, the scorch pictures as well? but I don't laugh when I make it. I guess Cole: I want to do a lot more. I like the I have an experience beyond the laugh. action in that, the act of doing it. I like Brown: Is there any connection between the fear element, that I could get burned references to violence and the urban doing that. I definitely have a fear of context in which the pieces are made or being burned. where the materials come from? Brown: It's interesting that the first ele Cole: Maybe it is just that my experi ment you chose to work with was fire. ence living in an urban environment has Cole: I like to think that the elements all of these elements in it So it comes choose the artist sometimes. out as a result of my life experiences. Brown: Well, the first one that comes There are a lot of things that I'd like to through is the one, in a sense, that had bring into the work that I haven't: I the most power for you. haven't come to grips with them emo Cole: Burning the canvas, you know, tionally or determined the best way to you hear it, you smell it, you feel the represent them in art. heat. There is something special in that Brown: One magical notion of art is that that translates throughout the piece, it transforms dross into gold; this is tak whether it be just the figure or the ing that idea to an extreme, or making it scorches themselves. very explicit. There's another interest Brown: Were you thinking of specific ing possibility: there's a reaction now textile patterns, a specific African against a lot of ethnography, studies of source when you made them? African art for example, as representing Cole: No, I just started out basic, one a salvage mentality, a pretentious next to the other. attempt to salvage a culture that maybe Brown: Do you use more than one iron doesn't need salvaging. And it's interest at a time? ing that you're on the one hand working Cole: Yes, because I do more than one with cultural references like African [textile] at a time. I haven't mixed irons art or Tibetan art for that matter and on in a piece yet... each iron has a differ the other hand with salvage materials, ent bottom. I use more Proctor-Silex literally, with urban detritus. because it is a more interesting iron Cole: I think that when one culture is design-wise. Even the handle of it is, to dominated by another culture, the me, already a goat, before I do anything energy, or powers, or gods of the previ to it. The first iron I saw of that kind was ous culture hide in vehicles in the new a Proctor-Silex. That's my favorite. culture. When the Africans came to the Brown: Why is violence a frequent U.S. they lost a lot of their cultural icons theme in some of your works? but the spirits of those icons are hidden Cole: I like the idea of it being danger in other things. It's like in the Yoruba ous, because I like people to react to religion all the Catholic saints have Afri things other than, "that's nice." Like can counterparts. So, it's the same thing. the dog on the piano [not in show]: the I think that maybe the spirit of Shango is first year he was made everybody said, something hidden in the iron because of "wow!" He was scary to people. Now the fire; the power of Ogon—his element people look at it and say, "oh, that's is iron—is hidden in these metal objects. beautiful." But in the beginning he was Brown: And so what you're doing is a very intimidating and I liked that a lot. way of helping that cycle be completed? That [presence] will determine if it is Cole: Yes, I'm working to release the going to have life. When something pro spirit through use or suggestion. I try to vokes a reaction, I just prefer that. But make the pieces look useful in some way. I get a lot of laughs from most of my work. People always see it as humorous. 19 20 Figure 7: Brown: Do you think these works are thing you realize that works, it's very Willie Cole. political? easy for you to make the same thing Neo-Senufo, 1988. Heat Cole: The salvage pieces are political in several times. If you refuse to do that ing coils, the sense that ecology has become a and continue to work, you'll exhaust all iron stand, political issue. But my making them your possibilities. It's like when you're rubber hose, scrap metal, deals with my aesthetic concerns and running a marathon, say, and you reach 21x20x9". my interest in spirituality. That's really the point where you've used all your Collection the first impetus for it. It just happens body's energy and you're running on of Dennis Derryck, that they're found objects and our world something else. That's what happens. New York. is filled with garbage. In that sense it If you limit your materials and exhaust might seem to be political. your obvious possibilities and then Brown: Are they made in response to a exhaust the most tangible elements of personal need? your imagination, you're forced to move Cole: It's possible there's a need that on some of that energy. And that's the I'm not conscious of, and I think this energy that I like to tap into. You do all is true with a lot of African-American that you can do through your own or artists, a need to find the Africa in them what you think about your own resources selves, whether they're conscious of it and powers and then plug into some or not it comes out in their work. I mean thing more universal than that and even that name, that label of African- things just find themselves. American, suggests some kind of symbi Brown: It shows, too: if it were just osis. And these irons are that basically. the most obvious process then they And I think it's not conscious. If I can wouldn't have that kind of staying power—and they really do. Interview show something and suggest something conducted else and everybody else doesn't see it Cole: Yeah, yeah, that's good to hear. May 30, that way, then I've expanded people's Brown: And they have a ritual power 1990. awareness. And, I like that feeling. to them, too. [When] I showed the telephone mask at Cole: Sometimes I don't want them to Artists Space people came up to me and look overworked. Sometimes I want said they'll never see phones the same them to look worked because the work way again ever. They say the same thing suggests time and time suggests energy about the irons. I like transformation in and energy suggests power. But I also your mind that sticks forever. like it to look simple sometimes, as if Brown: Is it possible that the things that somebody in a trance just came up to are serial, such as the telephones, repre these objects and conjured up a work sent a range of personalities or moods? of art... that doesn't always happen. Cole: See, when they are serial it's also a personal challenge to see how much I can do with a small amount, to see how many different combinations I can find for the same thing. Brown: This extraordinary efficiency of means. Cole: I like that as a personal challenge. It forces me to force me to force me. Even further than I would normally force myself. It's like if you have a table covered with irons and you make one 21 Renee Green Figure 8: Brown: There's a scholarly slant to all of Green: I had been thinking about differ Renee Green. your works that I've seen: either they ent cultural forms that people use, peo Which?, 1990. Photostats deal with systems or with historiography. ple who are the minority in a dominant and photo Where did these lines of inquiry start? culture—although those are problematic copies on ace Green: I think the various ways that terms—and I'd been thinking about the tate, vinyl tape, glass people have been classifying things over way these people use cultural forms like fishbowls the ages are so interesting. I've been music or writing. I'd been wondering and water focusing on the Western forms of clas about how something could be done in on wood, 96x30x9'.' sification, tracing them back to Aristotle the visual field. Collection of and the Greeks. Brown: How they use them to do what? the artist. Brown: Is that where you began, with Green: How they use them to transgress an interest in classification systems? the established forms. I'm thinking of Green: I was dealing with originary Cesaire with his knowledge of Latin and moments, trying to trace how numbers French surrealist literature. He draws began and how they were used in differ upon this knowledge and he also brings ent cultures. I was working a lot with these different Africanisms into the the history of science, really. And then I work. That was interesting to me. I'm extended my investigations to the realm also thinking about rap music, for of language. That's where the work of instance, or Prince, inserting all kinds the past few years has come from. I was of dubbed sounds into things. Or jazz really interested in the poet Aime even, improvisation, bringing different Cesaire and the transgressive language— snippets of classical music back and a poetry of neologisms—he was creating. forth. Or language, spoken language, of I wondered how a similar practice could African Americans—a way of twisting function in the visual realm. the language, twisting the correct Eng Brown: Translating the language spe lish grammar to mean different things, cifically? to make up new terms within the domi nant language. 23 Figure 9: Brown: How are you using form in your frequently, such as the theme of color, Renee Green. works then? all kinds of color, in different texts that Color III, 1990. Latex Green: I'm thinking about how there I've been collecting. For example, in and acrylic can be an interactive relationship Michel Leiris' book Manhood. There's a paints, rub between the viewer and the work. I part where he describes his own child ber stamp, vinyl letters, wanted to make shapes or set up situa hood memory of a book describing the vellum, and tions that are kind of open. You can have ages of man, and they're all color-coded. plexiglass multiple associations: I was thinking Every time I see something that has to on wood, 48x96'.' about multiple uses of language, such as do with color like that I just make a note Collection of punning, and how it's not always possi of it. I've just been doing that over the the artist. ble to pin down just one definition. My past year. Last summer I found this book work has a lot to do with a sort of called Colored Thinking. It caught my fluidity, a movement back and forth, not eye as I was walking down the aisle of a making a claim to any specific or essen bookstore. It had an orange cover and I tial way of being. An examination of liked the type, and I just picked it up. how our perception is constructed and Brown: What do you do with them how that moves back and forth and when you find it? Where do you start? [how] it's determined by different fac Green: I read a lot and I see what strikes tors, historical factors, personal factors, me as really odd, funny, or just weird. I all kinds of factors. I wanted the viewers mark my books up like crazy. I don't just to be really conscious about their role take it and use it like that. I ponder it for as spectators. a while and test different parts of it to try Brown: How do you find your sources? to reduce it to as short a passage as I can. Green: Mostly by reading. Sometimes by I do research at the library and trace seeing movies or listening to music. footnotes like academics do. Something Some things just present themselves so will interest me that I've been reading 24 and I'll look up the footnote and I'll try Green: Yes, they're a challenge. I'm to locate the source. That's what hap interested in the way that the bodies pened with the Hottentot Venus pieces. were dealt with in the nineteenth It also involves bookstores, browsing century—all women's bodies. in them and walking around. I work a lot Brown: Not just "foreign" women? with associative meanings. There is a Green: No, not just "foreign" women. long conceptual process; the forms But what's interesting was the way that always change as I work on them. I try the differences were made. I'm thinking to figure out the purpose for every ele of Reconstructing Womanhood by Hazel ment in the piece. Carby. She talks about the experience of Brown: Does your treatment of the text slave women and how that experience have to do with analyzing the writer's has been written about in slave narra bias or context? tives and then in the novels by black Green: I would say it does. I use forms of women. The whole view of sexuality in representation—the visual element—to terms of black women is really particu buttress what I'm trying to do in terms lar, and it goes back a long way. Even in of showing the text as a constructed Flaubert's Dictionary of Received Ideas, form. the definition of negress says something Brown: What effect are you seeking in about hotter than a blond or a brunette, that process? and that's interesting. I mean that's Green: Not closure, because I want a something that goes back really far, see sort of open-endedness to the work, but ing black women as a separate category I guess I don't want the connections to of beings whom there was easy access to. be arbitrary. I want them to function Josephine Baker and the Hottentot Venus more in the way that poetry does, where were both viewed as exotics. People's it sparks a remembrance or a thought desires and fantasies were projected onto them. and its connection It's more like the way that the unconscious functions. I Brown: And the peep-box element of Sa want to push it further, with different Main Charmante draws attention to just objects that enter the piece that might that sort of experience. spark an association that isn't necessar Green: Until recently I had buried this ily exactly what the words say. whole memory of a period when I felt Brown: How does Sa Main Charmante very self-conscious. I was living in Oax- (fig. 10) relate to your subsequent work aca, Mexico, in '84, and I could not go about Josephine Baker? out of the house without attracting lots Green: The link that I see is really the of attention. I was always treated as a whole construction of the way that curiosity and a freak. I felt like the butt women of African descent have been of all these different assumptions, which viewed historically. I find it really fas people were projecting on to me. That cinating and disturbing, and I feel that experience had a lot to do with my sen it's something that continues to the sitivity to a discrepancy between seeing present. It has to do with the way their and knowing. beings and their bodies are seen as for Brown: Do these historical themes eign territory. reflect personal concerns? Brown: In the same way that Africa was Green: I'm not interested in the confes foreign territory for explorers? sional mode for myself. I'm much more Green: Right, those mountains that... interested in the larger view. I found Brown: Look just like women's breasts. that throughout the ' 'great literature,'' black people, people of African descent, Moors, are usually portrayed as passive or as buffoons. To me that's personal. 25 Figure 10: I think of the Hottentot Venus piece Brown: How do you want the works to Renee Green. in a very personal way. I was identifying affect the viewer? Sa Main Charmante. in some way and thinking [that] this Green: I want people to ponder all the 1989. Instal is... about my own experiences. The kinds of cultural objects they come into lation: stage ways in which black women are viewed— contact with, and to question the books lights, paper, paint, and there's still this residue of accumulated they read and the films they watch. ink on wood, ideas about animality and sexuality That's the most obvious sort of thing. We ca. 70x88x being linked. must become aware of the constructed- 631/2'.' Collection of Michelle Wallace was talking about ness of every part of our experience and the artist. the Hottentot Venus, and Grace Jones, not just take it for granted. I want the and Josephine Baker, and Michael Jack viewer to be able to enter into a rela son. She noticed that what often hap tionship with the work from different pens in discussions of these figures is positions, different points of view. that they aren't considered to be postur Brown: How do you use your texts? ing. Whereas European artists are usu Green: I use the text in different ways, ally acknowledged to be taking on ways that have meanings that are not personas, usually the black figures are directly related; the word and the mean regarded as being essentially what they ing aren't necessarily equated. And appear to be. This perception has been there's this kind of slippage involved so used to assert that people of different that more connections can be made. A ethnicities were not capable of par literal example is the way that I use ticipating actively in the creation of words in the color pieces, where I list modernity. Instead they are seen as names of things that don't correspond to primitives—sources rather than actors. the objects. The perception of them would be very different if they were perceived as par ticipants as well. 26 I've gotten many kinds of responses from non-art-world people about the work. Since you can read it, there's that connection for people who don't neces sarily think of themselves as visual. They feel they have some access to the work by reading it. I want the reading to be pleasurable. I don't want them to look at it and go, "oh god, text!" That's why I want the type to be fairly large and broken up into small chunks. I think a lot about how long a line takes a person to read. I do a lot of calculations with a calcula tor figuring out how many characters can fit on a line—the same sorts of cal culations that are made in designing a magazine or a book. Brown: Does your emphasis on the ver bal itself contribute to your iconography? Green: Everyone names things, every one classifies things in some way. But the West has been able to enforce its Interview names or attach them—to make people conducted accept certain names. I am interested in Junel. 1990. , . ,. , ..... the implications of naming for African- American culture. Finding a name for African Americans as a group, for exam ple. There was something that was called the "names controversy" in the nineteenth century, which had to do with forging an identity and the impor tance of finding the correct name. Peo ple were trying to figure out whether they were free colored people or people of color or Afro-Saxons. The names have shifted from colored to Negro to Black to African American. The naming of a person, even naming yourself, has been associated with freedom. When slaves became free, they would often rename themselves. That was a really important part of throwing off the previous oppres sion. Naming is empowering as well as something that can be confining. I• • 1 Vivienne Koorland Figure 11: Brown: Most of your paintings are Koorland: Yes. I also hanker after what I Vivienne based on older images. How do you know I really love. I really love Poussin. Koorland. Questions choose your sources? I really love Giacometti. I know if I look and Answers Koorland: I've been working through at Giacometti paintings, it hurts, liter (Fear)I,i990. the whole gamut of the Western paint ally .... And it's that obsession with this Oilandpaper attached to ing tradition, mostly the Christian whole world of images that is my reli canvas, iconographic tradition. The point I am gion and has always been.... I have 44 l/2x at now, I feel I have to formulate a criti been this way, consciously, since I was 34 5/8'.' Collection of cal distance between myself and that about eleven. So that's pretty much the artist; tradition because, implicitly, in all that always. And I know that when I see courtesy of it's about, [it] actually excludes me. other work that I really admire where Sandra Gering After all, I'm a Jew—I'm not a religious it's obvious that this other person has Gallery. or practicing Jew, but I'm not a Chris really destroyed and let go in order to tian cleric. And I'm a woman. make again... I admire that kind of crea I started looking at sources that were tive energy so much. It's not my temper not from the mainstream tradition, a lot ament; I work very differently. from children's drawings or very middle Brown: Perhaps defining the process in brow or low-brow sources, like old post that way allows you to let go, as if cards, certain photographic images of plumbing that obsession, using it as your the First World War, certain cultural source, were a critical mechanism. documents like drawings that were Koorland: When I remake or reproduce made in concentration camps, or work a drawing that was made by somebody that was made under extreme condi else in 1943,1 don't have any illusions tions in one way or another. about changing it or bringing something Brown: Are you also looking at work in "different" to it. I do it because I need museums? to come to terms with it and remake it for myself, "it" being some aspect of 2!l a VLy* Figure 12: history for which the drawing is only a Brown: How are these issues manifest Vivienne sign. If in so doing I manage to add in the way you paint? What do you do Koorland. Take Me: something ' 'different'' to it, that's in the once you've found your source? Holiday eye of the beholder, because I don't Koorland: I almost always know what Time in Cape make those claims. Am I defiling the I'm going to do before I do it. I've already Town in the Twentieth drawing, am I abusing the source? I do it selected my surface, whatever it is, Century, any way; I don't have scruples in that whether it's a virgin surface or an older 1990. Pencil, regard. I'll rip up nineteenth-century painting that I'm working on top of, it's charcoal, card, news books; I don't feel a thing. Sometimes I already spoken to me of what it's going print, photo think the texts were so terrible, I have to be. graphs, and no wish to preserve them. I want to Brown: Is choosing the surface one of tape on paper attached to work over them. I want to blot out some the initial stages? canvas and of the damage. Koorland: It is. It absolutely is. I might burlap, Brown: It sounds almost like a ritual occasionally choose an image I'm going 40x983/4'.' Collection of activity, the way that you're using these to work from and not get it to work. the artist; things. That's because I'm having a problem courtesy of Koorland: When you point it out I can with the surface. Sometimes I quite like Sandra Gerig see why you say that. Maybe you're something and I'm sorry to have to paint Gallery. right. It makes sense. I do sometimes over it, but I know that what I'm going work from blank canvases but I often to paint over it has to come out on top of don't. That's the thing about painting- it. And that's happened recently a few it's very ritualistic, since you say the times. word. There's so much talking and writ Brown: How is Self-Portrait in Heaven ing about it, there's also the truth or the (fig. 13) composed? reality of the physical activity. I think Koorland: Those canvases are all pretty first of Maurice Merleau-Ponty who old. I think I've been working on them said, "the painter brings his body with steadily since about 1984. Actually him." Because first and foremost it's a 1982-83 [for] two, one about 1984-85... physical activity. •.•.'•••• - • ;>-<*l ttfe . ;#^. %; '--•-• • -' !& . I I 1 . i and one a year ago. They're all separate Koorland: Oh, I think funerary because paintings. Sometimes you work on some there are these laurel leaves. I started thing small and you feel the boundary using these leaves that initially came doesn't really make sense and so that's from frames. I once stretched a fine how I ended up joining them together. linen over a frame that had laurel And then I gave myself a bit of a fright leaves, and it sort of came through and because of course it came out in this sort then I ended up using such thick paint of cruciform. I thought, oh, I don't know that I flattened all of the molding, but if I want to get into that again, because I then I stuck the blobs of tar on and used to do a lot of that when I was made the leaves anyhow. I think on younger. some level, even unconsciously, you Brown: Why that title? read these leaves as on a gravestone. Koorland: I had a friend come in here Brown: Your other self-portrait painting and I guess she on some levels really is called Take Me: Holiday Time in Cape tuned into it and she took one look at Town in the Twentieth Century (fig. 12). this and said, ' 'Arbeit macht frei.'' And I What does that title mean? said to her, yeah, that's really right, but Koorland: That is the title of a Victorian I'd never name it that. And that's why I painting of that scene. Imagine one of called it Self-Portrait in Heaven. In these wild Victorian imaginings and a heaven, because of these stars and also wonderful painting of all these little because it's not a self-portrait of this details. Here are all these tokens, almost world. It's an internal self-portrait. like charms on a charm bracelet. It's like Brown: When you first said the title, I a rainbow. And they're all my mental assumed it was about death... there's a appendages: snapshots of the South funerary feel to it. African flowers that I took when I was there last August; Anne Frank; the Gateway in Nancy where I painted a lot 31 32 Figure 13: of paintings; the South African air let clippings and cut-up postcards or cut-up Vivienne ter; the paradise flower; the two free photographs and postcards stuck on Koorland. Self-Portrait dom drawings [quoted in Self-Portrait paper stuck on several panels with in Heaven, in Heaven and other recent works]; the masking tape. 1989. Oil, South African national flower; and that Koorland: I can certainly see your lead, pig ment, tar, picture from West Berlin, the wall point. I guess I think I'm doing straight charcoal, where someone was shot trying to get painting because I'm making paintings and paper over in the '60s. It's called Take Me: on canvas on stretcher. There's no desire on ca n vas, linen, and Holiday Time in Cape Town in the to break out of that format. I call it a burlap, Twentieth Century and the "Take Me" painting, I don't call it a collage. I don't 85x75'.' comes from Carson McCullers' "The call it a collage because I don't like col Collection of Member of the Wedding." It's about the the artist; lages. But I call it a painting because I courtesy of painful adolescence of this girl down feel like, why not. I mean it was a paint Sandra south during the Second World War. ing underneath and finally I resolved Gering [That citation] doesn't really make any Gallery. this painting by sticking paper over it— difference. I mean, that's all very so what. If I would have painted that interesting but not very relevant at all color, would that have made it a paint because this is going to mean what it's ing? And now I've stuck the paper on, so constructed to mean, whether I had to me it's still a painting. whatever in my mind or not. Brown: The more recent work repre So [I have called it] Holiday Time in sents a sharp departure for you, particu Cape Town in the Twentieth Century larly in your use of saturated colors. because it's all these appendages, as I What is its genesis? said, and when I go back there I feel like Koorland: [It's] a continuation, in the I really have to consider all these ap sense that I'm working from a source.... pendages. I've only been back twice in I'm working on a group of paintings that twelve years. Going back is such a very are [based on] drawings that were made strange experience, I think, for every in the Terezin ghetto. body who goes back to where they've We just got back from Prague. I've come from after a long time, if it's as far been trying to get there for two and a in all ways as South Africa, you know, half years. I went there in order to be and it's a different country and a differ able to do these paintings and that's the ent language and a different culture. real truth of why I went there. So, I had Those mental appendages, they were to go there to gather the material. I always there with me and they had no knew exactly what material I was going place there at the tip of Africa either, there to gather and I had to go there to you know. And that was why basically I get it. never stayed because what was Anne We spent one day at Theresienstadt, Frank at the tip of Africa, or these Terezin, out of Prague, and I came back drawings and these images? all fired up to make these paintings. But, Brown: I'm very intrigued by your even so, it's difficult. They're all very calling this a painting. I firmly believe different because different children that as soon as we passed 1912 the ques made them. They're stylistically differ tion of what is pure painting became ent and they're all a departure for me almost irrelevant. But still your asser and I had to destroy one or two other tion that what you're doing is straight paintings in order to do them because painting is very interesting with some one or two other surfaces begged these thing like this, which is drawings and paintings and I decided to give them up. 33 [Questions and Answers (Fear) I (fig. Koorland: I sometimes feel that that's a 11)] was a 1987 painting and it was really very morally wrong position because a nice painting and I was sorry to let it some people in this world have lost go but I had a picture of it. So, it was a everything. There are people who have pity to cover it up with the paper but, lost absolutely everything that one again, I had to do that. I did it because it could conceivably lose and then I feel had that quality of a sort of a child's that objects have no value. tempera drawing, you know, of painting Brown: But they nonetheless do have a on paper. value. Brown: And the study for it is a book Koorland: And they're enigmatic just as cover? our lives are because we don't usually Koorland: Yes, I've been making a lot of know how long we're going to live. And drawings on book covers. This isn't a we don't know how long an object has to study... I never make studies for paint live either. It can live for a long time or ings. I never do that because I know be destroyed right away. exactly what I want to do, and also Brown: The layering gives the canvases because I have this whole way of work a particularly forceful presence. Are ing that I think was really influenced by there other features that contribute to Giacometti and by the phenomenological that effect? writings about Giacometti and Cezanne Koorland: They're all so heavy, that's by Merleau-Ponty [and] I feel [that] the the other thing. I always build my own study has to be there in the painting. stretchers or if I don't, for whatever rea Brown: How do you think the form son, then I'll make them thicker or I'll changes the content? add to them to make them heavier. I Koorland: A painting has a presence, always have the feeling that this object has a very certain kind of presence that has to be really heavy because you're a drawing doesn't have. It's not that the expending all this energy on it. When I painting is a better presence but it's def came to this country I had been used to initely a different presence. It's there, moving around; I've been here almost undeniably, in a way that a drawing is eight years and I left South Africa not. A drawing is by nature quieter, twelve years ago. I really couldn't say more reticent compared with a painting. that any place was my home. But the This painting has resurrected the draw more I felt like it wasn't my home, the ing that I took it from, because the more I rooted myself here with heavy drawing is a little drawing on paper objects. To move myself out of here, I somewhere. But this oil painting is just couldn't just fill a backpack and go. vibrantly there. That drawing is living Brown: Is this [next] painting also based now through my painting. I sound like a on a child's drawing? medium! I know that it might sound Koorland: This drawing was made by funny and I'm not a mystic actually. I'm this little girl, Eva Winternitz, who died not a mystical person. I don't hold with in Auschwitz in 1944. She was born in any of that stuff. 1935 so I have the dates there. And I've Brown: Except that you believe objects written Auschwitz in Russian because can have more to them than just their my source had this information written material presence. in Russian. I usually keep the text in whatever language I find it. If you grow up in Europe it's second nature to understand more than three languages. 34 You just automatically understand a few words in another language... but here people are very threatened when they see other languages. Maybe not all peo ple. Not all people are threatened when they walk into a museum and don't like what they see. Some people get angry and I can't understand that response. Anyway, it's as if her little imagination failed her because she eventually is making those pictures on the walls. She thought of this funny mountain scene on the left and this grim repetition on the right. Brown: Of what's going on. Unless maybe it's before and after. Past, pres ent, future. The present being the larg est, the composition itself, and the past and the future being suggested. Koorland: Do you think an eight-year- old child...? Brown: Is capable of envisioning her own death? I don't know. It certainly looks like that, doesn't it? Freedom on one hand and nothing afterwards. Koorland: Yes. And I think that's true except that it might not have been con scious. That was a scene of freedom that was either built into the mythology or something that she really remembered or maybe she remembered it as a picture they once had at home. Brown: Why this fascination with extremes of experience? Koorland: Because I think that that's the reality. Everything else is the myth. Because the older you get the more you learn about the world and about history that was suppressed, whether it's a Stalinist massacre in some Polish forest, or whether it's the Japanese now admit ting to the Koreans that they were the most terrible oppressors for three dec ades, or whatever it is, you realize that Interview conducted an over the whole surface of the Earth, May 31,1990. this is the basic reality. 35 Jeanne Silverthorne Figure 14: Brown: The new sculptures dominating specific context it became metonymic. Jeanne your studio seem to be quite a departure In other words, I wanted to weaken that Silverthorne. Self-Portrait from your earlier work. universal symbol and open up the 1,1989. In Silverthorne: All along my work has representation of a woman's body to stallation: been about language. [I've been] trying multiple readings. rubbber, glass, paint, to establish a connection between body Brown: How do the other details con rear-view and language and protective devices. I tribute: the wheels under the two fig mirror, presented language as a kind of protec ures, the Rietveld-inspired pedestal, and hammer head, c. tion and substitution, like a prosthetic especially the banana peel? 68x28x17!' device. I was working through the the Silverthorne: That everything is on Collection of ories of Jacques Lacan and Jacques wheels is about, again, slipping away. the artist; courtesy of Derrida, particularly their investiga Peeling away something is basically like Christine tions of the notions that language repre being overexposed. Bur gin sents a loss of wholeness. Do words It's about playing against these sorts Gallery. replace more authentic feelings or do of very cliched notions of the female, of they have an independent existence? women's bodies. And I was also interested Then, gradually the words have been in taking a serious sort of icon, that can sort of slipping away, although not the be high modernist or very primitive... notion of language. These separate com and juxtaposing it with something quite ponents are really one piece. Not that silly... [using] those kinds of contradic they can't be separated. They're meant tions to make it all a little bit more to go together and the only thing that down-to-earth, and less winding off into cannot happen is that she [fig. 15, detail the ether of metaphor. Bringing it back of fig. 1] can never be shown by herself in some way, but not denying the power because [this work is] about contextu- of the metaphor either. Because the alizing that kind of primitive, very famil metaphor is still there and it's very pow iar fertility figure. That use of women's erful, I think. And the first read is prob bodies traditionally was a kind of meta ably fairly sexist. phor and by taking it and putting it in a 37 Figure 15: Brown: Are you concerned about the Brown: What about the small version, Jeanne piece being misread? sort of a variation on the same form? Did Silverthorne. Untitled, Silverthorne: It's easily misread if you it precede or follow the big figure? detailfrom talk about the proper reading being my Silverthorne: It followed it. Having installation, intention. On the other hand, I don't gone to one extreme, I wanted to go to 1989. Hydro- stone, hydro- know that I'm omniscient enough to the other extreme to avoid feeling cal, rubber, know what the proper reading is. I think constricted by being in one place. With silk, metal, that's fine. Meaning gets constructed, it this figure we're so much in the realm and wheels, c. 70x109 doesn't get put in. It would make me of heavy-duty seriousness... and it x90". uncomfortable if this were read in a looks like real sculpture. So, I thought, Collection of straightforward modernist way, but I'm well, that's ridiculous... [it] needs some the artist; deliberately inviting that too. thing sort of zany and out of control. It's courtesy of Christine I know that people are primarily going a little bit like the id tooling around Bur gin to respond to her (fig. 16) as the rein there—beep, beep. Gallery. forcement of those metaphors rather I once heard Meredith Monk talk about than a questioning of them, and it takes how she decides to present a scene and a longer read or somebody with a differ she was saying, ' 'I just want to pull it ent kind of history to go beyond that down a bit.'' And I thought, that's probably. I feel very overexposed with exactly it, you have this sense of excess this piece. I want to tap into that. It which you want and high whatever- must be pretty powerful for us and I high Gothicness, high romance, high want to tap into that power... this drama, high theater—and then, having notion of women, women's bodies, as had that, you want to, no, need to, pull it metaphors for everything that's danger down. It needs to get minimal now. ous, powerful, fertile, and mindless... limited in the sense that this figure is limited, nothing but flesh. 38 Figure 16: Brown: How does the frame fit into the Jeanne program? Silverthorne. Untitled, Silverthorne: I wanted something that detail from was a frame, that was a rectangle. And installation, so would read in some way architectur 1989. Hydro- cal, rubber, ally minimally, you know, cool. And and wheels. then there's this material itself, which is Collection of so kind of ugh, icky... personal, and the artist; courtesy of represents skin. Christine Brown: You've done other frame sculp Burgin tures before, right, the mirrors? Gallery. Silverthorne: Yes, the mirrors are also portraits that don't work in a sense. They don't reflect, even though they're silvered. But they're also, in contrast to mirrors that are real, unbreakable. In all the self-portrait pieces I was interested in the notion of the mirror being the place where you first get your sense of identity. The child doesn't see itself whole until it's presented with its own image in the mirror, and for the first time sees it has a whole body. It can see itself as whole rather than a hand, or an arm, or what have you. And it also tends to see the other person as separate from itself for the first time too in this mirror, whoever it is that's presenting the infant to the mirror. So, the mirror becomes the instrument of identity, of this sort of myth of wholeness, which is our notion of self-identity, which never really fully takes effect because you still tend to think of yourself as fragmented. I was interested in playing off that idea of fragmentation, so you get these various parts which combine to make the self portrait [including] the mirror that doesn't represent wholeness but at the same time is unbreakable. So there is a kind of indestructibility to the ego in some ways and yet a kind of dispersion. You don't really have a core identity but you somehow have the intuition that you're whole. 39 Brown: Why did you make the DNA reason I played [DNA] off these histori pieces? cal references. And the other is that I'm Silverthorne: Having dealt with pros very interested in using that familiarity thetics and body [in earlier work], I as a seductive technique both for the wanted some part of the body that was viewer and for myself. It makes me feel invisible, that wouldn't literally read as like I'm part of the whole club, you a body part. So I came up with DNA know. It gives me a sort of reassuring because it certainly is a part of the body familiarity and I hope it's a hook for but it's not something we can see or viewers, that they can be made comfort think of as the body. And it's in and of able by the familiarity of what they're itself language or code. And I wanted to seeing. And so be drawn in and then for turn it inside out. I mean DNA makes get whatever else is going on. our bodies and I wanted to make bodies That's how our taste has been formed. or figures out of DNA. So that was a We like this stuff, you know, let's face it, reversal. even though many of us are excluded I found one image of DNA which looks from it. Here we are, all looking at these like twisty macaroni, or like a zipper images that a handful of white men that's twisted.... I just started unravel have made that have been for the most ing it and making it come apart, come part validated by a handful of white loose.... All I did was make [strips] in men. But it's the taste of everybody clay and started playing with them, and who's been in any way a museum-goer a figure came out (fig. 17). I was playing or interested in art. So you've got this around with DNA and a figure came contradiction at work where you know Figure 17: out. Which I think is funny. you're looking at a vision that's been Jea n ne Brown: It's very funny. imposed on you and that has nothing to Silverthorne. Silverthorne: Which is what DNA kind do with you, but you've imbibed and DNAII. 1988. Rub of does. you've internalized it and it's now your ber and wax, Brown: Given half a chance. taste; it's now what you like to look at. 14x26x30". So, again, I guess I'm interested in Collection of Silverthorne: Having made this one fig the artist; ure, which was somehow, well, was kind reclaiming that [art], taking it for my courtesy of of a collapsing figure or rising figure, I own in a way. Christine Burg in wanted something that was more hori Brown: You emphasize a psychoanalytic Gallery. zontal. So the figure of an odalisque approach to your work. came into my mind. And then immedi Silverthorne: I was trained as a literary ately I knew I had male-female issues critic and my earliest training was in going on here. psychoanalytic literary criticism, so I'm Brown: With these particularly there steeped in that. These are the counters seems to be art-historical referencing in my symbolic universe. going on. This one is very much like Brown: That approach is there with Boccioni. Matisse and Boccioni? Silverthorne: I was interested in mak Silverthorne: Exactly. But also I have a ing a pun on Futurism because DNA sort of penchant for symbols, for that is—for me, being sort of scientifically kind of representation or metaphor. I illiterate—certainly my notion of Futur mean, I'm not an abstract artist. I would ism. To take a style that is now histori die if I didn't have... cal, but [whose creators] thought it was Brown: Levels of referencing. about the future, and apply it to this Silverthorne: Yes, exactly. Symbolic very, at the moment, futuristic DNA references [that are] multi-layered, dif structure, which is already, I'm sure, ferent kinds of discourse, and allusions outmoded and outdated... that's one to different kinds of discourse, litera ture being one, art history being another, the personal being another. Brown: Who are your influences? Brown: Is art a criminal activity? Silverthorne: Eva Hesse, Louise Bour Silverthorne: Art is a criminal activity geois, obviously, and then almost any for me. I'm interested in guilty art making. kind of modern and contemporary Now that there's been this big interest sculpture. Ree Morton—I don't know if in the body what worries me is that it you can see the influence, maybe it's not could be anti-intellectual and it could be direct, but she was the person whose really regressive and reactionary. Even work I saw who made me want to be though so far the writing that surrounds come an artist. I had walked into an it has been very theoretical, the work installation, Sister Perpetua'sLie, [at] itself is not always self-aware. But then the ICA in Philadelphia and [was] just this kind of work flirts with that. I'm blown away and thought it was just the worried about that. That's why I would most amazing.... I thought this, this is always feel that the work needs to be right. I want to do this. This can accom grounded in theory. modate me... I didn't know art could be Brown: How do you signal that preoccu this. That it could be so many different pation visually? things, it was so mysterious, so compli Silverthorne: That signaling element cated. I loved the way it looked because can vary. In this most recent installation ... it had both process and structure, I think perhaps it's the framed piece. and mystery. It was personal. It was Frames today represent the conceptual. intellectually complex. There's some I hope that the sign of the frame will thing about her mode of activity that I infuse the reading of the other elements, think is a big influence. which might otherwise be interpreted Interview Brown: What part does theory play in as utterly unconscious. The disjunctions conducted the work? and other contradictions will reinforce June 3, 1990. Silverthorne: It plays a very heavy role. the idea that this is also theoretical work. I'm a very theoretical person. The work Brown: How do you want the viewer to of people like Barbara [Kruger] and respond to your work? Sherrie [Levine] and all these women Silverthorne: Ideally, what I'd love is who've [made] these very analytical and for people to respond the way I responded wonderful works has allowed me to do to the Ree Morton—a combination of work that can be read as ambivalent but being moved, being intellectually stimu not confused. They were not in a posi lated, and being mystified. But not tion to fool around with these issues; closed out, being invited to go further they were not in a position to allow any and further, [to be] engaged. It's inter thing except a kind of single reading. esting, I was just thinking, you know, it's And because they've done it it's maybe about process but it's also about beauty possible to... and seduction. The beauty of just being Brown: To make it look more ambiguous. seduced by how something looks, which Silverthorne: To make it more ambigu I think is an interesting issue, that some ous, yeah. For instance, we're talking how the notion of being pretty enough about issues of representation; it may be as a woman can spill over into worry possible for a woman to wade back into about whether the work is seductive- representation now. And I'm gambling looking enough. You can get very much that it's possible because they made it so into the glamour of how something clear how tainted representation was. looks and I do. I know people often Brown: So the activity becomes more think these things are quite ugly and it charged now. startles me not because that's bad or that they mean it as a criticism, but I'm Silverthorne: More clearly charged. It's actually trying to make things as beauti more clear what you're playing around ful as I possibly can. with. It's more clear what the crime, the transgression is now, thanks to them. JBMMfe?' -. Group Material Figure 18: Brown: How do you actually work become busy and we find ourselves "New Coke" together? How do you start? doing things for a particular context. In Ault: There are certain ideas that we'll other words, now we have a site and we get or develop as a group, that are not have a situation and we have to respond coming from someplace else. Then there to that site and that situation, whereas are ideas that we have that have been in the past we were more often design kicking around for a while or that will ing situations or problems that we were come up, like at a dinner party. Doug interested in. will say something, I'll add to it, Karen Ault: I think we're kind of in a transi will respond, and then we'll come up tional stage now. Up until this point it's with something and say, "let's do that." worked out perfectly in that the situation And that'll be a self-initiated project. would align itself with what we're think Inserts was a project like that. The idea ing about. Since usually what we deal had been kicking around for a long time with are topical issues, we're thinking that we wanted to insert something in now about wanting to address historical The New York Times, and so we devel issues, [rather than] just responding to oped that and went and found the fund what's going on in current political events. ing and really did the whole project Recently though we've had a couple of ourselves. But more often than not we situations where this is beginning to feel end up working in a particular context really constricting. It just doesn't feel and it's usually under the sponsorship or very spontaneous and it also seems at the invitation of some art institution. more chore-like. We're being called in Ashford: Sometimes they also match. to do a job, take care of these political There will be things that we are upset issues or fill a certain void that's not by, or obsessed with, or interested in being filled with other work. And I and then the opportunity or the context think individually each of us and all of will come along and they fit together. us as a group have other ideas we want But there has been a radical change to work with too. even in the past three years since we've 43 Ashf ord: It's due to, if you think about it, I think we have to try to figure out what not just changes within but also changes it's all about: when it's trendy you know without. In earlier days, the cultural that it's going to disappear, it's not like issues and ideas that we were concerned real change. with were outside of institutions and Brown: Generally projects are made therefore sub-cultural by definition. either for a particular neighborhood or They are not necessarily mainstream for a certain constituency or for the now, but they're things that people like New York art world. I think that you're you are interested in. trying to address all those different Brown: There are now cultural institu audiences. tions prepared to deal with those. Ault: Yes, we are. Ashford: Right, believe it or not, in Ashford: And we're also trying to find museums and in other institutional con different audiences in different contexts. texts, you can go to a board meeting and Just because you do something at the people are actually talking about issues Whitney doesn't mean that you are nec of marginality. They're even talking essarily doing it specifically for what is about the function of culture in a soci presumed to be the New York art-world ety based on gender, race, and class divi audience. Because you realize that sions. This is what we were obsessed every Sunday the place may be full of with years ago. I'm not saying that those high school kids. concerns are now dominant in every Brown: That's the question, how do you institution. I think that a Group Material address the different groups? project becomes a chore when it's set up Ault: It depends on the project, some [in that way]. There's an intellectual times it's very specific. history that was marginal and has now Ashford: The idea of mixing audiences partially entered the institutional appa can be a problem because location, archi ratus of the art world. We have a place tecture, or language all predetermine there that's often predicted. And so we your audience. It's like when people say end up in the situation, as Julie said, "the art world," what do they mean, where we're kind of contractors, ' 'well, which art world? For instance, there's an we know what you do, you do great ceil art world in Bedford-Stuyvesant. There's ings, come in and do that ceiling." Well, a museum, there's Restoration, there are we don't do ceilings anymore, maybe we neighborhoods where artists live, even should do floors now. famous ones such as Spike Lee. How come Ault: And my reaction, sometimes we no one ever calls that' 'the art world?'' joke about wanting to do something Ault: Any venue or any situation is lim totally aesthetic, decorative [as] a reac ited. Somehow the East 13th Street tion against being expected to do a cer exhibition's audience will suddenly be tain thing. But suggesting that these called "the people" and then the exhibi agendas and issues are becoming main tion, say at Dia, is for "the art world." stream is really tricky. On the one hand And you know these are just preconcep it really is true that, say, multiculturism tions that we try to break down and try is an issue talked about and addressed to ignore as much as possible or deal more often now; the Whitney is having with in a more realistic way, because these panels about black film makers, all East 13th Street is East 13th Street, these different museums and institu that's not "the people" anymore than tions that usually could not care less about responding to criticism about being white and male are actually tak ing this into account and dealing with it. 44 Brown: What criteria do you use to de termine if something's successful or not? Ault: That's a really hard question. We don't really have criteria, I think, to determine if something is successful. We felt that AIDS Timeline (fig. 19) [at Ber keley] was a success; we were totally pleased with the way that all this infor mation had come together. Not only that we had accomplished what we set out to do, but that it engaged people, this really dense information about medical his tory, the political and social history, and the context for how AIDS became a crisis. We also showed the grass-roots response and other responses to the crisis. It's a lot of information, you know, to put ten years of this crisis into a gallery that's eighty feet long. We were told that peo ple wouldn't read a lot of text. The aver age that people spend in an exhibition is probably about two minutes, maybe a half hour for the whole museum, but people were in this exhibition for two hours. To spend two hours in this one room actually reading and taking in this information, watching the videos, going Figure 19: the Dia Art Foundation audience is "the back and forth to different parts of the Group art world." None of these groups or Material. timeline, and making connections... audiences is monolithic. They have a lot AIDS that felt really successful. We felt that it Timeline, of variation. When we deal with the really accomplished something and it detailfrom idea of audience I think we first try to Installation was accessible and engaged people. That get rid of the preconceptions, then we at Univer was a clear-cut case of success. sity Art try to figure out what the possibilities Ashford: It depends on the project. Say Museum, are: who our possible audiences are, University the billboard project in Chicago that we how what we're trying to say or what ofCalifornia, just finished with Randolph Street Gal Berkeley, the information is would be accessible lery, Your Message Here. I thought that Matrix Gal to those audiences, and also it's got to lery, Novem was really, really successful, because be something that we feel. The way of ber 11,1989- there was a process behind it in terms of January 28, addressing people, or the manner in creating social relations between differ 1990. which we actually produce something, ent kinds of cultural groups. There are has to be something that we all are very about seventeen art worlds in Chicago comfortable with and that we can explain. which actually had never dealt with each other, or rarely dealt with each other in a productive context. There are people 45 from the South Side who had never been Ashford: The whole issue of design as a to Randolph Street. There were art organ tool is not necessarily negative. All izers and curators from Randolph Street through the '60s people were interested who had never been to these places on in social change: there were certain the South Side. All these different pro things you couldn't do because they ductive forces, and personalities, and were considered complicit with the organizations worked together, actually- establishment. This again is like seeing sat in a room together and had discus certain social structures, especially in sions about what public artistic discourse the media, as monolithic. For us it's an could be about, and what advertising issue of legibility and legibility is about does, and how art could reclaim adver accessibility. So if we have something tising. These incredible exchanges prob that we need to say and want others to ably wouldn't have happened without understand, why not say it beautifully? this project. And so in that way it was Ault: I don't think that ' 'beauty'' is a incredibly successful, in terms of the bad word, but because beauty is so sub process. jective, it's a sticky word to use. The Brown: Is it always social change that idea of accessibility and making it invit you're interested in affecting? ing can mean obviously it's not just for Ashford: Yes, as long as we're not limit the audience either, it's for ourselves. ing the definition of social change. Change could also be within a cultural context. Just to get a bunch of young people who are thinking of becoming Figure 20: artists to realize that culture might have Original a social place or that they don't neces Coca-Cola. sarily have to conform to an idea of an artist as a white male hero. We try to present a model of how culture can work to explain and to create a context for the historical crisis that we're in now. Brown: Where do aesthetics come into it? Ault: Aesthetics, I don't have a problem with aesthetics. Ashford: I don't have a problem with aesthetics either, we like to make things as beautiful as we can make them. It has to do with, first of all, redefining the idea of beauty or the list of ' 'beautif uls'' that are associated with art in the first place. We're trying to point out the problematic aspects of such terms, that's a given, but also to question the traditional visual models of social change, especially within a history of the American left. "When something's effective, it can't be well done." Ault: It can't be aesthetically pleasing. 46 The aesthetic decisions we make are Ashford: It's not radical at all to say determined by the world as we see it that to an art historian. and our culture. It's not like we would Ault: So, in a sense, what we do on throw those away and say, let's only do many levels is very traditional. red and black cause that's political... it Ashford: Often when we give a public doesn't make sense. I think, because our presentation people ask, "how did you aesthetics have a lot to do with popular come up with this, it seems so new?" culture and media, this is the way of Ault: Like it's so strange. communicating now. A lot of it has to do Ashford: "Where'd you get these ideas, with competing to attract people's at it's so revolutionary?" When you start tention to the issues and ideas that we're making a list, you could start at Courbet working with. We're interested in some or farther back and just keep listing peo thing much more popular than tradition ple who have had similar ideas. It's very ally what would be defined as leftist. consistent, that art could have an emo Ashford: But then that gets tricky too tional and social function and that those because although we're trying ideally to could be simultaneous. But that's what popularize something, at the same time the liberation of the individual is about. we're interested in questioning what The whole idea of liberating the subject people would consider popular. Why do still seems to be a viable social project. things become popular? There are pri vate forces influencing what people like. Corporate culture sometimes deter mines all of this for us. Remember New Coke? Those of us who resist the domi Figure 21: "Classic nant culture should see ideological sys Coke." tems as self-generating. Institutions can create desire almost overnight. When New Coke came out there was a political movement to bring back Old Coke. It was a grass-roots thing. What we got was Classic. Ault: I think that a lot of people just don't see aesthetics or method or the way things work as being anywhere equal to the subject. The problem, say, with "political art," is that it's political art. It's not art that's political. The poli tics are 90% and then there's 10% which is just how to do it, how to get it out there. Whereas we really see this mar riage of form and content as being cru cial to the politics and to communicating political ideas. Brown: I think it's one of the things that art does. It's art because part of the meaning is carried by aesthetic issues and elements. It affects you in a certain way before you can define what it is that's there and being affective. 47 Ault: I know we're kind of getting away Brown: It sounds like instead of a cor from aesthetics but it is just amazing to porate model for method, it's an organic me that people believe that artistic deci model, it's like a body. sions are not political. I think that we Ault: And it's a much more democratic really think about every decision, every model. artistic decision is political and is social, Ashford: I think we found a more appro socially determined. priate type of collaboration. Group Brown: Group Material's been around Material itself has an identity that's sep now for eleven years, right? 1979 to arate from us. I know I personally feel 1990, how do you think that history this all the time, because, when I'm affects what you're doing now and how speaking as "Doug," I often speak dif do you perceive your development actu ferently. In a way perhaps we all feel ally as an entity if not in terms of indi equally subservient to it, in that we've vidual careers? created a situation where Group Material Ault: There are a number of perceptions needs us in a way, to defend it. about what Group Material is that sur Brown: Is it a problem that Felix hasn't prise us. People will say things like, been around for most of the discussions "well, now that you're successful," or for this project? "now that you're mainstream." These Ault: It is and it isn't. Usually what we kind of stupid conceptions about fame do is we convince one another so that and success that people have colors the we reach agreement. If there's some way they read what we do. I think thing that one of us feels strongly against there's a slight feeling that we've been ... it's not like a vote, we compromise Interview put on this treadmill to a certain extent. and reach an agreement. conducted [They] don't look at the whole practice Ashford: When one of us is gone it is a with Doug and at all the diversity within the Ashford and problem, on the one hand, because the Julie Ault projects and the different methods of nature of the beast has changed again, June 2. 1990. working. We do these works we could but it seems to survive for a while. I call more public works like Inserts I or really miss Felix because I love Felix, but Subculture or the shopping bag that we also because the way I work then did for Hamburg; then we do these exhi changes a little bit when he's not here. bitions that would be perceived as less Just like not having Karen here at this public because they're inside a space interview probably changes how I think. and you have to make an effort to go see Ault: It's really interesting, you think them. We're always going back and that we all know each other well and forth. We're always working with these you can think that you would, say, come two types of methods, so that we don't up with something and I'd say to myself, get pigeonholed. Eleven years is a long oh, I know Karen's going to go for this time but at the same time the group has and then Karen will have a totally dif changed a lot. The structure of the ferent response. No matter how well you group has changed a lot. We've really know someone you can't know how kind of reinvented our own process and they're going to react. I think we all at this point I think it's much more of a surprise each other sufficiently to keep true collaboration and an unusual col it interesting. laboration in that we don't just contrib ute our skills. We don't just pool our skills or expertise; we really, all of us, try to develop each aspect of the project together. 48 Works in the Exhibition Willie Cole. Proctor-Silex Green. Corallium Rubrum, Koorland. Terezin: Eva, (Evidence and Presence), FungiaPatella, etc., 1989. 1990. Oil on paper attached 1989. Reassembled steam Paper, Van Dyck prints, dry to linen, 52x62". irons, plastic, rubber, canvas, pigment, and asphaltum on Collection of the artist; steel, and wood, figure masonite, 60x48". courtesy of Sandra Gering 26 1/2x4x17 1/2", textile Collection of the artist. Gallery. 78 1/8x681/2", base 47x 9 1/4x29". Green. Color III, 1990. Latex Koorland. Terezin: Hana II, Collection of the artist. and acrylic paints, rubber 1990. Oil on paper attached stamp, vinyl letters, vellum, to linen, 81x113". Cole. Steamers, 1989. Steam and plexiglass on wood, Collection of the artist; irons, 201/2x10x6". 48x96". courtesy of Sandra Gering Collection of the artist. Collection of the artist. Gallery. Cole. Neo-Senufo, 1988. Green. Which?, 1990. Jeanne Silverthorne. DNA II, Heating coils, iron stand, Photostats and photocopies 1988. Rubber and wax, rubber hose, scrap metal, on acetate, vinyl tape, glass 14x36x30". 21x20x9". fishbowls, and water on Collection of the artist; Collection of Dennis wood, 96x30x9". courtesy of Christine Derryck, New York. Collection of the artist. Burgin Gallery. Cole. Wind Mask (North), Group Material. Economics: Silverthorne. Self-Portrait I, 1990. Blow dryers, Oberlin Project, 1990. 1989. Installation: rubbber, 19 1/2x21 1/2x13". glass, paint, rear-view Collection of Klaus Vivienne Koorland. Self mirror, hammerhead, Littmann, courtesy of the Portrait in Heaven, 1989. c. 68x28x17". artist. Oil, lead, pigment, tar, Collection of the artist; charcoal, and paper on courtesy of Christine Cole. Wind Mask (South), canvas, linen, and burlap, Burgin Gallery. 1990. Blow dryers, 85x75". 20x20x11 1/4". Collection of the artist; Silverthorne. Self-Portrait II, Collection of Klaus courtesy of Sandra Gering 1989. Installation: hydrocal, Littmann, courtesy of the Gallery. rubber, glass and plastic, artist. c. 26x26x14". Koorland. Take Me: Holiday Collection of the artist; Cole. Wind Mask (East), Time in Cape Town in the courtesy of Christine 1990. Blow dryers, Twentieth Century, 1990. Burgin Gallery. 23x29 1/2x15". Pencil, charcoal, card, Collection of the artist. newsprint, photographs, and Silverthorne. Untitled tape on paper attached to installation, 1989. Cole. Wind Mask (West), canvas and burlap, 40 x 98 3 4 ". Hydrostone, hydrocal, 1990. Blow dryers, Collection of the artist; rubber, silk, metal, and 22x24x16". courtesy of Sandra Gering wheels, c. 70x109x90". Collection of the artist. Gallery. Collection of the artist; Renee Green. Sa Main courtesy of Christine Koorland. Questions and Burgin Gallery. Charmante, 1989. Answers (Fear) I, 1990. Oil Installation: stage lights, and paper attached to paper, paint, and ink on canvas, 44 1/2x34 5/8". wood, ca. 70x88x63 1/2". Collection of the artist; Collection of the artist. courtesy of Sandra Gering Gallery. 1H Willie Cole Born in Somerville, New Jersey, 1955. Educated at Boston Selected Bibliography University School of Fine Arts, Boston (1974-75); The School Sinclair, Estelle F. "Styles," Time Off/Princeton Times, March of Visual Arts, New York City (B.F. A. 1976); The Arts Student 1986, pp. 16-17. League, New York City (1976-78). Lives in Newark, NJ. Watkins, Eileen. "City Without Walls Exhibit Features Solo Exhibitions 'freewheeling sources and materials,''' The Star Ledger 1986 Educational Testing Service Corporation, (Newark, NJ), September 26, 1986. Princeton, NJ Loughery, John. Review of "Dog Days of August" (exhibition at Littlejohn-Smith Gallery), Arts Magazine, vol. 61, no. 2 Selected Group Exhibitions (October 1986), p. 125. 1986 ' 'Dog Days of August,'' Littlejohn-Smith Gallery, New York City Filler, Marion. "New Show at St. Hubert's: Animal Imagery,' " "Lucky Seven Show," Moonmade Space, New Daily Record (Madison, NJ), September 13, 1987. York City Watkins, Eileen. "3 Jerseyans Win Afro-American Art 1987 ' 'Personal and Political Statements,'' Paul Contest," The Star Ledger (Newark, NJ), May 18, 1988. Robeson Center Gallery, Newark, NJ 1988 ' Art Junction International,'' Palais des Zimmer, William. "Works Derived from the African Expositions, Nice, France Experience," TheNew York Times, July 17, 1988. ' 'Ten Thousand Mandelas,'' Franklin Chery, Brigitte. "Faire la Foire a Nice: Art Junction Furnace, New York City International '88," Art Themes, July 1988, p. 7. 1989 "From the Studio: Artists-in-Residence, 1988-89," The Studio Museum in Harlem, Laffont, Nicole. "Dans lededalede la creation vivante," New York City Nice-Matin, July 14, 1988. ' 'In the Blood,'' P.S. 39/Longwood Arts Project, Bronx, NY Gottesman, Alice and Donald, Linda. "They Do Windows," "Selections from the Artists File," Artists The Village Voice, August 1988. Space, New York City (organized and Greenstein, Jane. "Visuals: Exhibits Challenge Viewers to catalogue by Cornelia Butler) Look Closely," Gold Coast Magazine, February 23, 1989, "Director's Choice," Artworks: The Visual p. 20. Arts School of Princeton and Trenton, NJ ' 'Material Forms,'' New Jersey Center for the Raynor, Vivien. "The Influence of Dada and Its Offshoot," Visual Arts, Summit, NJ TheNew York Times, February 26, 1989. 1990 "Suggestive Objects,'' Art in General, New Zimmer, William. "When One Culture Dominates Another," York City TheNew York Times, July 23, 1989. ' 'Special Projects,'' The Institute for Con temporary Art, P.S. 1 Museum, Long Island Raynor, Vivien.' 'Sculptures That Test the Idea of Opposites,'' City, NY TheNew York Times, October 1, 1989. "From the Studio Museum," Amelie A. Wallace Gallery, State University of New Fairley, Juliette. "Cole's Art Irons Out Social Kinks," The City York/College at Old Westbury, Long Island, NY Sun (New York), November 1-7, 1989, p.26. "... Like Cats and Dogs: Cartoons and Sculp Brenson, Michael. "Show at Studio Museum of Its Artists in tures,' ' Park Avenue Atrium, New York City Residence," TheNew York Times, December 15, 1989. ' 'A Force of Repetition,'' New Jersey State Museum, Trenton, NJ 50 Renee Green Born in Cleveland, Ohio, 1959. Educated at The School of 1987 "New Works by Six Artists," Bronx Museum Visual Arts, New York City (1979-80); Wesleyan University, of the Arts/Hostos Art Gallery, Bronx, NY Middletown, Connecticut (B.A. 1981); Radcliffe College, "American JuJu," The Works Gallery, Harvard University (Summer 1981); Whitney Museum Inde Newark, NJ pendent Study Program (1989-90). Lives in Hoboken, NJ. ' 'Artists of Diverse Cultures: Toward an Inclusive Art History," New York State Solo Exhibitions Council on the Arts, The Studio Museum in 1979 "Untitled Installation,'' The School of Visual Harlem, and The Metropolitan Museum of Arts, New York City Art, New York City 1981 "Habitations," Center for the Arts, Wesleyan "Glasnost A-Go-Go," Cafe Bustelo, New York University, Middletown, CT City 1985 "Metonymies," Ona, New York City "Home," Goddard-Riverside Community 1986 ' 'Paintings and Books,'' Rogers & Cogswell, Center, New York City (organized by Faith Hoboken, NJ Ringold) 1987 '' Recent Work,'' John Jay College, New York 1988 "New Jersey State Council on the Arts 1987- City 88 Fellowship Exhibition," Monmouth "Paintings and Constructions," Spare Room, Museum, Lincroft, NJ New York City "Coast to Coast," Diverse Works, Houston, 1988 Jersey City Museum, NJ TX; Wooster College, Wooster, OH (1989); 1989 Artspace, Jersey City State College, NJ Depauw University, Greencastle, IN (1989); William Carlos Williams Center, Rutherford, NJ Center for Book Arts, New York City (1989) 1990 "Anatomies of Escape," The Institute for 1989 " Under the Influence," City Without Walls, Contemporary Art, The Clocktower, New York Newark, NJ City "Lines of Vision: Drawings by Contemporary Women,'' Hillwood Art Gallery, Long Island Selected Group Exhibitions University, Brookville, NY; Blum-Helman Gallery, New York City; two concurrent 1978 '' Women's Show,'' Center for the Arts, Main exhibits travelling to museums and universities Gallery, Wesleyan University, Middletown, CT in U.S. and Mexico, Latin America, Spain, 1979 '' Print Show,'' The School of Visual Arts and Portugal through 1991. (Catalogue by Gallery, New York City Judy Collischan, Thomas Leavitt, and Judith 1980 "WVAC Group Exhibition," World Music Wilson.) Center Gallery, Middletown, CT 1983 ' 'A Love Story,'' Just Above Midtown Gallery, "Evil Empire," Eljira Gallery, Newark, NJ, New York City and P.S. 39/Longwood Arts Project, Bronx, NY "Art Biz," Just Above Midtown Gallery, New "Art Against Apartheid '89," Goddard- York City Riverside Community Center, New York City "Selections 23," The Drawing Center, New "From the Studio: Artists-in-Residence, 1988-89," The Studio Museum in Harlem, York City New York City 1985 "Before and After," Four Walls, Hoboken, NJ ' "The Nicaragua Show,'' Four Walls, Hoboken, NJ 1990 ' Ancestors Known and Unknown,'' Art in "Group Show," A & P Gallery, New York City General, New York City 1986 "Another World," Bronx River Gallery, "From the Studio Museum," Amelie A. Bronx, NY Wallace Gallery, State University of New York/College at Old Westbury, Long Island, NY "The All Natural Disasters Show," P.S. 1/ "Images from the Common Ground," Art in Longwood Arts Project, Bronx, NY General, New York City ' 'The Censorship Show,'' Four Walls, "Expense/Account: Figuring the Damage," Hoboken, NJ University of Rochester, Rochester, NY ' 'Spring Collection: Small Works," 22 Wooster (catalogue by Elizabeth Dalton and Cynthia Gallery, New York City Smith) ' "The Last Supper,'' The Back Porch, Rehoboth, DE, and Detail, New York City (1987) Whitney Museum of American Art, "Five Years," Bronx River Gallery, Bronx, NY Independent Study Program, New York City "Women Artists," Guild Gallery, The Urban "Woman, Native, Other," Hunter College, League, Newark, NJ New York City "Group Exhibition,'' Artists Space, New York City "Beyond Post-Modern Aesthetics," Krygier/ Landau Contemporary Art, Santa Monica, CA (organized by Charles Gaines) 51 Publications 1981 No Title, The Collection of Sol LeWitt, The Wadsworth Athaeneum, Hartford, CT and Wesleyan University, Middletown, CT. Contributed entries on Adrian Piper, Lawrence Weiner, and Sylvia Mangold. 1986 Travels in New Spain, an Abbreviated Jour nal, artist's book, Ergo Press, Hoboken, NJ 1990 "We Won't Play Other to Your Same,'' Meaning, no. 7 (May), pp. 15-16. "which?," Whitney Independent Study Program Journal Selected Bibliography Moodie, Ellen. "Science World Becomes Art in Hoboken Loft," The Jersey Journal (Jersey City, NJ), April 5, 1988. Raynor, Vivien. ' 'The Influence of Dada and Its Offshoot,'' TheNew York Times, February 26, 1989. Robinson, Lauren. "Friends Support Group Cultivates New Interest in Harlem's Studio Museum,'' The Star Ledger (Newark, NJ), March 28, 1989. Jones, Kellie. "The Net," The Village Voice, Art Special, Spring 1989. Raynor, Vivien. "When the Villain is Colonialism," TheNew York Times, October 29, 1989. Reschop, Julia. "Best of the Arts,'' Paper (New York City), November 1989. Brenson, Michael. "Show at Studio Museum of Its Artists in Residence," TheNew York Times, December 15, 1989. Fairley, Juliette. ' 'Anatomies of Escape,'' The City Sun (New York City), May 9-15, 1990. Brenson, Michael. "Renee Green—Anatomies of Escape," The New York Times, May 25, 1990. Levin, Kim. "Turning the Tables," and "Choices," The Village Voice, June 19, 1990. Bishop, Kathy. "Fanfare: Canvased Opinions," Vanity Fair (New York edition), June 1990. 52 Vivienne Koorland Born in Cape Town, South Africa, 1957. Educated at 1990 "Collages and Constructions,'' Henry Feiwel, University of Cape Town, Michaelis School of Fine Art (B.A. New York City 1978); Hochschule der Kunste, West Berlin (M.F.A. 1980); Renee Fotouhi Fine Arts, New York City Ecole Nationale Superieure des Beaux-Arts, Paris (1980-82); "Artists in China," The Institute for Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture, Skowhegan, Contemporary Art, P.S. 1 Museum, Long Maine (Summer 1983); Columbia University, New York Island City, NY (organized by Susana (M.F.A. 1984). Lives in New York City. Rorruella Leval, Howard McCalebb, Nancy Spero, John Yau) Solo Exhibitions Sandra Gering Gallery, New York City 1981 Hochschule der Kunste, West Berlin Maison des Etats-Unis, Cite Universitaire, Selected Bibliograpy Paris Lipton, Eunice. "Vivienne Koorland," Arts Magazine, vol. 63, 1985 Jus De Pomme Gallery, New York City no. 7 (March 1989), p.79. 1987 Cathedral Church of St. John the Divine, New York City Thomas, Maxwell. "Expressive Painting with a Conscience," 1988 LedisFlam Gallery, Brooklyn, NY Columbia [University] Spectator, November 16, 1989. "Drawings from the Trial of Klaus Barbie and Paintings for the Children of Izieu," Yeshiva University Museum, New York City, with David Rose 1990 Sandra Gering Gallery, New York City Saint Peter's Church at Citicorp, New York City Selected Group Exhibitions 1981 Schering GMBH, Students of Klaus Fussmann, Academy of Fine Arts, West Berlin Hochschule der Kunste, West Berlin Institut de France, Academie des Beaux-Arts, Paris, Paul-Louis Weiller Portrait Prize Competition "Salon d'Automne," Grand Palais, Paris 1982 "5e Salon Paris de la Mairie du 14e Arrondissement," Paris ' '40 Jeunes Peintres de 1'Atelier Yankel- Perlin," Ecole Nationale Superieure des Beaux-Arts, Paris "Salon d'Automne," Grand Palais, Paris 1984 "New Artists, Mixed Media," 112 Greene Street, New York City (organized by Irving Sandler) 1987 Ten Windows on Eighth Avenue, New York City 1988 "Large Drawings," LedisFlam Gallery, Brooklyn, NY 1989 ' 'Selections 44,'' 12th-Year Anniversary Exhi bition, The Drawing Center, New York City ' 'Continuing Witness: Images by the Children of Survivors of the Holocaust," B'nai B'rith International Museum, Washington, DC Sandra Gering Gallery, Brooklyn, NY LedisFlam Gallery, New York City 53 Jeanne Silverthorne Born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, 1950. Educated at Temple 1988 "Invitational," Bali Miller Gallery, New York University, Philadelphia, PA (B.A. 1971); Pennsylvania Academy City of Fine Arts, Philadelphia, PA (1971-72); Temple University, Christine Burgin Gallery, New York City Philadelphia, PA (M.A. 1974). Lives in New York City. 1989 "Fragments, Parts, and Wholes," White Columns, New York City (organized by Saul Solo Exhibitions Ostrow) 1981 Nexus Gallery, Philadelphia, PA "Group Exhibition," American Fine Art 1982 Nexus Gallery, Philadelphia, PA Gallery, New York City The Institute for Contemporary Art, P.S. 1 1990 "Matter and Memory," Marta Cervera Museum, Long Island City, NY Gallery, New York City 1990 Christine Burgin Gallery, New York City Houghton House Gallery, Geneva, NY Selected Bibliography McFadden, Sarah. "Report from Philadelphia," Art in Selected Group Exhibitions America, vol. 67, no. 3 (May-June 1979), pp. 21-31. 1979 ' 'Open Friday,'' Moore College of Art, Butera, Anne. "New Talent Shows—A Time of Farewell," Philadelphia, PA Philadelphia Bulletin, June 10, 1979. "New Talent,'' Eric Makler Gallery, Philadelphia, PA Sozanski, Edward J. "Art: More New Talent at the ICA," The 1980 ' 'Artists of the Alliance Juried Exhibition,'' Philadelphia Inquirer, March 13, 1984. Philadelphia, PA, and Glassboro State College, Glassboro, NJ Handy, Ellen. Review of "Messages" (exhibition at Carlo Lamagna Gallery), Arts Magazine, vol. 62, no. 6 (February 1981 "Words and Images," Southern Alleghenies 1988), pp. 105-106. Museum of Fine Art, Loreto, PA, and Pittsburgh Center for the Arts, Pittsburgh, PA Morgan, Robert. "Review," Tenia Celeste, vol. 7, pt. 1 (April- 1982 "Mixed Bag," Alternative Museum, New York June 1990), p. 63. City (catalogue by Geno Rodriguez) 1983 "Sophia's House," Pennsylvania Academy of Ostrow, Saul. "Jeanne Silverthorne" (interview), Bomb, no. Fine Arts, Philadelphia, PA 32 (Summer 1990), pp. 41-45. "Artist/Critic," White Columns, New York City 1984 "Made in Philadelphia 6," Institute of Contemporary Art, Philadelphia, PA (organized by Marcia Tucker and Ned Rifkin, catalogue by Ned Rifkin) "Found Language," Franklin Furnace, New York City (catalogue by Larry List) 1986 "Sculpture Invitational," Brooke Alexander Gallery, New York City "Momento Mori," Centra Cultural Arts Contemporaneo, Mexico City (organized and catalogue by Richard Flood) 1987 "Standing Ground," The Contemporary Arts Center, Cincinnati, OH (catalogue by Sarah Rogers Lafferty) "Messages: Nancy Dwyer, Cynthia Kuebel, Nancy Shaver, Jeanne Silverthorne, Nancy Spero," Carlo Lamagna Gallery, New York City (organized by Deana Barron) 54 Group Material Founded in 1979 1986 "Liberty and Justice," The Alternative Current Members are Doug Ashford, Julie Ault, Felix Museum, New York City (catalogue) Gonzalez-Torres, and Karen Ramspacher "Arts and Leisure," The Kitchen, New York City (catalogue) 1987 "Resistance—Anti-Baudrillard," White Exhibitions and Projects Columns, New York City 1980 "The Inaugural Exhibition," Group Material "The Castle," Museum Fridericianum, Headquarters, New York City Kassel, West Germany (organized for ' 'The Salon of Election '80,'' Group Material, ''documenta 8"; catalogue) New York City "Constitution," Temple University Gallery, "Alienation," Group Material, New York City Philadelphia, PA 1981 "The People's Choice," Group Material, New 1988 "Inserts,'' Advertising supplement to the York City Sunday New York Times, New York City "Consumption: Metaphor, Pastime, 1989 "Democracy," The Dia Art Foundation, Necessity,'' Group Material, New York City New York City ' 'The Gender Show,'' Group Material, New ' 'Aids and Democracy,'' Neue Gesellschaft York City fur Bildende Kunst, Berlin (organized for "Facere/Fascis,'' Group Material, New York City "Vollbild, AIDS") "Atlanta, An Emergency Exhibition," Group "Unisex,'' The Lesbian and Gay Center, New Material, New York City York City (organized for "The Center Show") "Enthusiasm!," Group Material, New York City "Shopping Bag," Kunstverein in Hamburg, "M-5," The public buses of New York City Hamburg 1982 "Daziabaos," Public installation on Union "Aids Timeline," Matrix Gallery, University Square, New York City Art Museum, University of California, "Works on Newspaper," Group Material, New Berkeley, CA York City 1990 "Aids Timeline (Matrix 111)," Wadsworth "Primer (For Raymond William),'' Artists Atheneum, Hartford, CT (brochure by Space, New York City Andrea Miller-Keller) ' 'Luchar, An Exhibition for the People of Central America,'' The Taller Latinoamericano, Selected Bibliography New York City Lonegan, Brian. "New Artists Settled," The Other Paper, 1983 "Revolutionary Fine Arts," Group Material, September 1980. New York City Marzorati, Gerald. "Artful Dodger," TheSoho Weekly News, ' 'Subculture,'' The IRT subway trains of New October 15, 1980. York City 1984 ' 'Timeline: A Chronicle of U.S. Intervention Goldstein, Richard. "Enter the Anti Space," The Village in Central and Latin America," P.S. 1 Voice, November 11, 1980. Museum, New York City (organized for Artists Call) [documented in "Winter" Hess, Elizabeth. "Home-Style Looking," The Village Voice, catalogue, The Institute for Art and Urban January 28, 1981. Resources] Lawson, Thomas. "The People's Choice," Artforum, vol. 19, 1985 "A. D.: Christian Influence in Contemporary no. 8 (April 1981), pp. 67-68. Culture," Work Gallery, New York City "Americana," The Whitney Museum of Lippard, Lucy R. "A Child's Garden of Horrors," The Village American Art, New York City (organized for Voice, June 24,1981. the Whitney Biennial; catalogue) Smith, Valerie. "Group Material, Consumption: Metaphor, "Democracy Wall," Chapter Arts Centre, Pastime, Necessity," Flash Art, no. 103 (Summer 1981), pp. Cardiff, Wales 53-54. "Mass," Traveled 1985-87; venues included Hall walls, Buffalo, N.Y.; Spaces, Cleveland, Lippard, Lucy R. "Revolting Issues," The Village Voice, July OH; The New Museum, New York City 27, 1982. (handout) "Messages to Washington," The Washington "Exposition Conjunta," ElDiario, August 1982 (magazine Project for the Arts, Washington, DC section). "Alarm Clock," Festival Hall, London Silverthorne, Jeanne. "Primer: (for Raymond Williams)," (organized for ' 'The Other America") Artforum, vol. 21, no. 3 (November 1982), pp. 75-76. 55 La Rose, Paul. "Subway Art On the Way," TheNew YorkDaily Wallis, Brian (ed.). Art After Modernism, New York, 1985, pp. News, August 9, 1983. 352 and 354. Brenson, Michael. "Art People," TheNew York Times, August Fisher, Jean. "Group Material," Artforum, vol. 25, no. 2 26, 1983. (October 1986), p. 128. Talmer, Jerry. ' Art Rides a Hole in the Ground,'' The New York Jones, Ronald. "Group Material," Flash Art, no. 134 (May Post, September 17, 1983. 1987), pp. 88-89. O'Brien, Glen. "Subculture," Artforum, vol. 22, no. 4 Miller, John. "Baudrillard and His Discontents," Artscribe, (December 1983), pp. 80-81. no. 63 (May 1987), pp. 48-51. Hall, Peter. "Group Material: An Interview," RealLife Marmer, Nancy. "Documenta 8: The Social Dimension?," Art Magazine, no. 11/12 (Winter 1983-84), pp. 2-7. in America, vol. 75, no. 9 (September 1987), pp. 128-140. Glueck, Grace. "Art: Interventions on U.S. Latin Role," The Sherlock, Maureen. "Documenta 8: Profits, Populism and New York Times, February 3, 1984. Politics," The New Art Examiner, vol. 15, no. 2 (October 1987), pp. 22-25. Lawson, Thomas. "Timeline," Artforum, vol. 22, no. 9 (May 1984), p. 83. Wood, William. "A Circular Insanity," Vanguard, vol. 16, no. 4 (September/October 1987), pp. 21-28. Lippard, Lucy R. Get the Message?, New York, 1984, pp. 206, 251,252, 254, 267, and 330. Magnani, Gregorio, et al. "New Art and Old Tricks," Flash Art, no. 136 (October 1987), pp. 69-74. Moore, Alan and Miller, Marc (eds.). ABC NO RIO Dinero, New York, 1984, pp. 22-27. "Anti-Baudrillard," File Magazine, no. 28, pt. 1 (1987), pp. 109-119. Levin, Kim. "The Whitney Laundry," The Village Voice, April 9, 1985. Isaak, Jo-Anna, "Documenta 8," Parachute, no. 49 (December-February 1987-88), p. 30. Newton, Deborah. "Vox Pop Becomes Wall to Wall Art," South Wales Echo, April 19, 1985. Smith, Roberta. ' 'Working the Gap Between Art and Politics,'' TheNew York Times, September 25, 1988. Osman, Sally. "Turning Over a New Leaf in the Exciting History of Chapter," The Western Mail (Cardiff, Wales), Critical Art Ensemble. "Interview, Group Material," April 30, 1985. Artpapers, vol. 12, no. 5 (September/October 1988), pp. 23-29. Lippard, Lucy R. "One Foot Out the Door," In These Times, July 9-22, 1985. Alaton, Salem. "N.Y. Artists Get Vocal About Politics," The Toronto Globe, October 20, 1988. Cullinan, Helen. "Spaces Imports New York Works: A Foot Per Artist," The Plain Dealer (Cleveland, OH), July 15, 1985. Spector, Nancy. "Democratic Vistas," Artscribe, no. 72 (November/December 1988), pp. 10-11. Plagens, Peter. "Nine Biennial Notes," Art in America, vol. 73, no. 7 (July 1985), pp. 115-118. Wye, Deborah. Commited to Print (exh. cat., The Museum of Modern Art), New York, 1988, pp. 8,18,26, and 97-115. Grove, Lloyd. "People's Voice," The Washington Post, August 31, 1985. Hess, Elizabeth. "SafeCombat in the Erogenous Zone," The Village Voice, January 10, 1989. Norman, Sally. "Exhibit Features NY Collective," The Plain Dealer (Cleveland, OH), August 1985. Levin, Kim. "It's Called Denial," The Village Voice, January 17, 1989. Liebmann, Lisa. "Almost Home," Artforum, vol. 23, no. 10 (Summer 1985), pp. 57-61. Olander, William. "Material World," Art in America, vol. 77, no. 1 (January 1989), pp. 123-128 and 167. Cameron, Dan. "Whitney Wonderland," Arts Magazine, vol. 59, no. 10 (Summer 1985), pp. 66-69. "Art and AIDS," The Village Voice, February 7, 1989. Tillman, Lynn. "Group Material" (interview), The Village Voice, October 15, 1985. 56 Lippard, Lucy R. "Apple Panache and Downtown Dowdy," ZetaMagazine, February 1989, pp. 82-84. Wilson, Beth. "Political (Mono)culture," Fad Magazine, no. 12 (February 1989), p. 52. Decter, Joshua. "Group Material," Flash Art, no. 145 (March/ April 1989), p. 111. Denson, G. Rodger. "Group Material, 'Education and Democracy,' "Artscribe, no. 75 (May 1989), pp. 84-85. Jones, Bill. "Graven Images," Arts Magazine, vol. 63, no. 9 (May 1989), pp. 73-77. Deitcher, David. "How Do You Memorialize a Movement That Isn't Dead?," The Village Voice, June 27, 1989. Helfand, Glen. "Brave New Material," SanFrancisco Weekly, November 22, 1989, pp. 1 and 13. Bonetti, David. ' AIDS Timeline Gives Hard Facts...," San Francisco Examiner, November 24, 1989. Helfand, Glen. "AIDS Reality Enters Art," Artweek, November 30, 1989. Drobnick, Jim. "Dialectical Group Materialism" (interview), Parachute, no. 56 (October-December 1989), pp. 29-31. "Group Material's Cultural Activism," University Art Museum/Pacific Film Archive, University of California (Berkeley), January 1990. "Group Material" (artist pages), Artpapers, vol. 14, no. 1 (January/February 1990), pp. 38-39. Berkson, Bill. Review of "Group Material, AIDS Timeline," Artforum, vol. 28, no. 7 (March 1990), pp. 168-169. Staniszewski, Mary Anne. "The New Activism," Shift, vol. 3, no. 1 (1990), pp. 9-11. 57 Allen Memorial Art Museum Oberlin College Museum Staff Visiting Committee Board of Trustees William J. Chiego, Director Joan L. Danforth, Vice- George R. Bent, Chairman Beatrice M. Clapp, Chairman Johnetta B. Cole Administrative Secretary Andre Emmerich (B.A., 1944) Joan L. Danforth Larry J. Feinberg, Chief Allan Frumkin Andrew Delaney Curator Judith Hernstadt The Reverend John D. Elder Elizabeth A. Brown, Curator Richard Hunt Karen G. Flint (Mrs. Peter H.) of Modern Art Richard W. Levy, Chairman James W. Ford Ellen H. Johnson, Honorary Robert M. Light (B.A., 1950) Frances K. Grossman Curator of Modern Art Robert B. Menschel Anne Krueger Henderson Anne F. Moore, Curator of Jan Keene Muhlert (M. A., Ralph F. Hirschmann Education 1967) Priscilla S. Hunt (Mrs. Corinne Fryhle, NEA Intern Victoire Rankin Richard B.) in Education Reynold Sachs (B.A., 1961) Herbert W. Kaatz Joan-Elisabeth Reid, Heinz Schneider Thomas J. Klutznick Registrar John N. Stern (B.A., 1939) Loriann T. Olan Susannah H. Michalson, Evan H. Turner William R. Perlik Assistant to the Sylvia Hill Williams (B.A., James E. Pohlman Registrar** 1955) Alfred M. Rankin, Jr. Kimberlie G. Fixx, Collection Nancy Coe Wixom (M. A., Albert Rees Records Researcher * * 1955) William L. Robinson Leslie J. Miller, Membership James H. Ross Katharine Kuh, Honorary and Special Events Robert I. Rotberg Member Administrator * Gunther Schuller Scott A. Carpenter, Rachel F. Seidman Collection Committee Preparator Alexander D. Shriver Henry H. Hawley Elizabeth Wolfe, S. Frederick Starr, President William E. Hood, Chairman, Intern/Assistant to the Victor J. Stone Department of Art, Preparator Sylvia H. Williams ex-officio Elsie E. Phillips, Custodian Alan L. Wurtzel Alfred F. MacKay, Dean, Marjorie L. Burton, Security College of Arts and Supervisor Honorary Trustees Sciences, ex-officio David R. Walker, Security Walter K. Bailey Louise S. Richards (M.A., Officer Robert B. Blyth 1944) Laura L. Wolf, Security John R. Brown Allen Wardwell Officer Martha Dalton Velma M. Adams, Security (Mrs. George R. Ill) Officer* Joseph W. Elder Anthony W. Ball, Security Bernard L. Gladieux Officer* Erwin N. Griswold Timothy Diewald, Security John H. Gutfreund Officer* Jane D. Highsaw (Mrs. James Mark K. Hoyt, Security L., Jr.) Officer* Richard J. Kent Montgomery N. McKinney * Part-time Lloyd N. Morrisett * * Part-time, temporary or Eric T. Nord special project Jesse Philips Jeanne H. Stephens (Mrs. Members of The Department James T.) of Art faculty also act as John N. Stern advisors to the Museum in F. Champion Ward their areas of expertise, and, along with the staff of the Clarence Ward Art Library, assist the Museum's work in many ways. 58 Publications Allen Memorial Art Museum The Allen Memorial Art Museum is located at Bulletin, vols. I-XLIII, 1944- 87 No. Main Street, at the intersection of Ohio 1989. Some issues out of print. Routes 511 and 58. It is open to the public Indexes available through free of charge, Tuesday through Saturday vol. XXX at $1.00 each. 10:00 am to 5:00 pm and Sunday 1:00 pm to 5:00 pm; closed Monday and major holidays. Painting and Sculpture Acquisitions 1966-1969 (Bulletin vol. XXVII, no. 2), 24illus.,$2.00. Catalogue of Islamic Carpets (Bulletin, vol. XXXVI, no. 1), $12.50. Catalogue of European and American Paintings and Sculpture, 1967, 359 pp., 278 illus., $7.50. Catalogue of Drawings and Watercolors, 1976, 295 pp., 303 illus., $12.50. Also available from the Museum are photographs, postcards, notecards, numer ous exhibition catalogues and slides of works in the collection. 59 Photographic Credits All photographs by Eddie Watkins except: [Group Material, Education and Democracy] photo Ken Scules, courtesy of Dia Art Foundation [Group Material, AIDS Timeline] photo Ben Blackwell [Koorland, Self-Portrait in Heaven] photo Cosimo di Leo Ricatto [Green, SaMain Charmante] photo Erik Landsberg Coca-Cola cans, photos courtesy of the Coca-Cola Company [Silverthorne, DNA H] photo Ken Showell [Koorland, Take Me: Holiday Time in Cape Town in the Twentieth Century] photo Peter Muscato