DE NY/ CE DC An Exhibition on the Centenary of the NT 1913 Armory Show Andrianna Campbell E R and Daniel S. Palmer February 17-April 7, 2013 September 11-December 20, 2013 Abrons Art Center Luther W. Brady Art Gallery The Henry Street Settlement The George Washington University 466 Grand Street 805 21st Street, NW New York, New York 10002 Washington, DC 20052 TABLE OF CONTENTS Introduction iv David Garza, Executive Director, Henry Street Settlement Introduction v Lenore D. Miller, Director, University Art Galleries and Chief Curator Digital Art in the Modern Age 1 Robert Brennan Rethinking Decenter 2 Daniel S. Palmer Decenter: Visualizing the Cloud 8 Andrianna Campbell Nicholas O’Brien interviews Cory Arcangel, Michael Bell-Smith, James Bridle, Douglas Coupland, Jessica Eaton, Manuel Fernandez, Sara Ludy, Yoshi Sodeoka, Sara VanDerBeek, and Letha Wilson 14 Nicholas O’Brien The Story of the Fiftieth Anniversary of the Armory Show 20 Charles Duncan Reprint of the Founding Document of the Abrons Arts Center 23 Winslow Carlton, President of Henry Street Settlement Artworks 24 List of Works 47 Acknowledgements 50 Published in conjunction with the exhibition: DECENTER NY/DC: An Exhibition on the Centenary of the 1913 Armory Show, Abrons Arts Center, The Henry Street Settlement February 17-April 7, 2013 and Luther W. Brady Art Gallery, The George Washington University, September 11-December 20, 2013. Catalogue designed by Alex Lesy © 2013 Luther W. Brady Art Gallery, The George Washington University. All rights reserved. No portion of this catalogue may be reproduced without the written consent of the publisher. ISBN: 978-1-935833-07-9 “Decenter” iS DEFINED AS: To cause gallery to offer an exciting and original iel S. Palmer, to whom we are indebted. to lose or shift from an established center statement to complement the New York We hope this thought-provoking evocation of focus. Historical Society’s exhibitions, and of times past and present will further gen- The Art Show in the Park Avenue Ar- should appeal strongly to GW students erate outreach for GW’s arts initiatives. mory sets a standard amongst the world’s who have embraced the digital world in While the Armory Show took place in ever-proliferating international art fairs. their artistic practice and social media. New York, its hundredth anniversary is It was at the 2013 Art Show, organized by We have thus initiated a highly innovative being celebrated all over the country. We the Art Dealers Association of America dialogue and collaboration with New York are proud to commemorate this great art (ADAA) to benefit Henry Street Settle- curators. The Luther W. Brady Art Gallery historical legacy. I would like to ac- ment, that I learned of the existence of has raised its capability of borrowing art- knowledge David Garza, Executive Direc- a contemporary and complementary ex- work for exhibition from other academic tor, Henry Street Settlement for making hibition, DECENTER: An Exhibition on institutions and museums and has staged an introduction to DECENTER. We are the Centenary of the 1913 Armory Show. exhibitions of the work of internationally grateful to Clarice Smith for her generos- It was originally shown in the Abrons renowned artists. ity in supporting this exhibition. Arts Center, Henry Street Settlement Modified to fit the Luther W. Brady Art from February to April 2013. Gallery’s space and augmented with work Lenore D. Miller Presenting DECENTER here at the by DC area artists, this adaptation is guest Director, University Art Galleries Luther W. Brady Art Gallery enables the curated by Andrianna Campbell and Dan- and Chief Curator INTRODUCTION HENRY STREET SETTLEMENT is hon- York. The event, one of the first to make work and remains a dynamic home ored to have hosted DECENTER: the vital connection of philanthropy to where artists can experiment with all An Exhibition on the Centenary of the the art world, was the creative vision of art forms. The 27 emerging and interna- 1913 Armory Show, at our Abrons Arts Margaret Carlton (Mrs. Winslow Carlton) tionally recognized contemporary artists Center. While DECENTER highlights and Alice Kaplan (Mrs. Jacob Kaplan). It featured in DECENTER are a true the diversity and expansiveness of the was on this occasion that we announced testament to our history of innovation. 1913 show’s legacy, the exhibition also our commitment to build a new cultural We are deeply grateful to the curators celebrates Henry Street Settlement’s center, today known as the Abrons Arts Andrianna Campbell and Daniel S. past, present and future as a pioneering Center. Henry Street continues our arts Palmer, Visual Director at the Abrons art institution. legacy through the annual Art Show at Arts Center Jonathan Durham, and The Armory Show was pivotal in the the Park Avenue Armory in partnership the participating artists for mounting Settlement’s full embrace of the arts. with the Arts Dealers Association of this groundbreaking exhibition at In 1963, Henry Street sponsored the 50th America, the first of multiple art fairs Henry Street. anniversary exhibition of the show, which inspired by the original Armory Show. explored its historic significance through To this day, the Settlement’s Abrons David Garza a partial recreation at the Munson-Wil- Arts Center supports the creation and Executive Director liams-Proctor Arts Institute in Utica, New presentation of bold, multidisciplinary Henry Street Settlement iv v DIGITAL Art IN RETHINKING DECENTER THE MODERN AGE DANIEL S.PALMER ROBert BRENNAN Rococo, rococo, rococo, rococo. Rococo, rococo, rococo, rococo. —Arcade Fire IF YOU WOULD HAVE ASKED visitors to eign to us now. Some would say we’re the the Armory Show in 1913 what “modern wiser for it. But far too often we forget art” was, there’s a good chance they that our inability to think like moderns would have described what we today call doesn’t mean the problems that occupied art nouveau. This was only the latest in them have simply gone away. Are we not a long succession of styles in European still, amidst the Great Recession, coping art called modern in their time, from with the consequences of automation? Is Gothic to Renaissance and Rococo. Not the health care crisis not still essentially a that every style was born modern, as if problem of distributing the fruits of rapid by default: many fashioned themselves as technological development? Is climate torch-bearers of classical antiquity. And change not yet another unforeseen con- since the path laid down by the ancients sequence of industrialization that leaves was broad enough to encompass much those who trust the scientists little choice variety and innovation, the moderns who but to commit to an even more radical managed to stray from it usually did so in program of transformation? recurrent, established ways, either as al- There is no question that digital lies of new science or champions of fleet- technology has the potential to move ing pleasure. The modernity of this or us beyond the service economy. It that art could thus last a very long time— remains to be seen, however, whether long enough that it should not surprise that transformation will entail anything Jessica Eaton, CFAAL 140, 2013. Photograph: 40 x 32" and John Newman, Headturners Prop and Kiss Greyed Stripes, 2008. Cast bronze, acrylic us to find the art of the Armory Show more than a reshuffling of employees 1 paint on acqua resin, wood putty, Japanese paper, papier-mache, foamcore, armature wire: 22 ⁄2 x 8 x 5". still, 100 years later, called modern. It from counters to distribution centers and took Jacques-Louis David and the French delivery routes. Could digital art offer Revolution to displace the modernity of such a society more than palliatives for NINETY-NINE YEARS after Marcel Du- and its historiography. As the two of us that drew explicit parallels between 1913 the Rococo. What would it take for us to boredom? Just as it didn’t take long for champ caused an uproar with his Nude worked to develop an exhibition together, and 2013 or came across as a history displace Picasso’s? our 20th century modernists to grow tired Descending a Staircase, No. 2, a poster and continued our studies (we were both lesson. Instead, we took the anniversary Many are convinced that our epoch of making armchairs for weary business- designed by the master sat tucked away in doctoral students at the time), we were as an opportunity to analyze the changes will go down in history as the digital age. men, neither do many artists of the digital a utility closet at Henry Street Settlement’s thrilled to discover that Abrons had in fact in perception that have been brought It is clear, moreover, that this convic- age rest content designing screensavers. Abrons Arts Center. This reinterpretation been created with funds raised by Milton on by the technologies of our digital age tion has accompanied a radical deple- Nor should we be discouraged by those of his famous painting quietly touted the Brown’s groundbreaking work on the by assembling contemporary artworks tion of our ability to hope for the future. who, measuring the initial results of our “50th Anniversary of the Famous Inter- Armory Show and its fiftieth anniversary that speak to “the legacy of Cubism in Today’s realists look forward to a world efforts against such vague ambitions, national Armory Show 1913, Re-created celebration. This realization eventually led the hundred years since the Armory where smartphones adjust thermostats; deem them boring or superficial. Indeed, in the original armory, Lexington Avenue to our Decenter exhibition, and after some Show’s radical display of modern art, and its dreamers, to one where languages as it occurred to Hegel in his medita- and 25th Street, New York for the benefit more digging, we found the framed poster especially, how (it has) become relevant are learned at the click of a button.