Composição II | Anos 50/70: para além da pintura, Parte 1 | 2015-05-13

M. Botelho, 2015-05-13

“No art is any longer historically mandated as against any other art. Nothing is any more true as art than anything else. ” Arthur Danto. After the End of Art. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1997. Pág. 27.

Defesa e contestação do “Modernismo” de Clement Greenberg e Michael Fried

“Quanto a mim, a essência do modernismo reside na utilização dos métodos característicos de uma disciplina para criticar a própria disciplina – não com o objectivo de a subverter, mas para a entrincheirar mais firmemente na sua área de competência. […] Foi a afirmação […] da inelutável planura [flatness] do suporte que permaneceu o mais fundamental dos processos através dos quais a arte pictórica se definiu e criticou  dentro do modernismo.” Clement Greenberg, “Modernist Painting”, 1960.

“Em traços largos, a história da pintura desde Manet, passando pelo cubismo sintético e Matisse, pode caracterizar-se em termos da retirada gradual da pintura da função de representar a realidade […] a favor de uma crescente preocupação com problemas intrínsecos à própria pintura.” Michael Fried, “Three American Painters”, 1965.

Anos 50
1 Paradigma dominante (modernismo greenberguiano?)
2 Movimento dominante: expressionismo abstrato
3 Especificidade do médium; purificação da pintura
4 Prioridade às questões de ordem formal | Abstração enquanto tendência “historicamente necessária”
5 Separação entre arte e política | Separação entre arte e vida
6 Separação entre High & Low (alta e baixa cultura)
…

Anos 60/70/...
1 Extensão e/ou negação do modernismo greenberguiano
2 Fragmentação da vanguarda (pluralismo): Pop, Minimalismo, Arte Conceptual, Land Art, etc.
3 Diversidade de mediums – Post-Medium
4 Diversidade de opções de ordem temática e formal
5 Novo empenhamento político-social | Articulação entre arte e vida
6 Negação das fronteiras entre High & Low (alta e baixa cultura)
…

Modernismo greenberguiano posto em causa (Dadaismo revisitado)

Rauschenberg, Untitled, Erased de Kooning Drawing, 1953, vestígios de lápis e tinta sobre papel

George Maciunas, Manifesto Fluxus, 1963, offset sobre papel, 20,3 x 15,2 cm

“Expurguem o mundo da enfermidade burguesa, da cultura «intelectual», profissional e comercializada, expurguem o mundo da arte morta, da imitação, da arte artificial, da arte abstrata […] Promovam uma corrente revolucionária na arte, promovam a arte viva, a anti arte, promovam a realidade não-arte, a ser compreendida por todas as pessoas, não apenas por críticos, diletantes e profissionais […] Congreguem os quadros revolucionários culturais, políticos e sociais numa frente e ação unidas”. George Maciunas, “Manifesto Fluxus”, 1963

John Latham, Art and Culture, 1966, mala contendo livro de Greenberg, carta de demissão da St. Martins, frascos com produtos, etc., 7,9 x 28,2 x 25,3 cm. Colecção: Museu de Arte Moderna de Nova Iorque.

Robert Morris, Untitled (L-Beams), 1965-66, installation view, Leo Castelli Gallery

“…the literalist espousal of objecthood amounts to nothing other than a plea for a new genre of theater; and theater is now a negation of art.” Michel Fried, “Art and Objecthood”, 1967.

“Li o artigo do Michael Fried [Art and Objecthood]… que era uma espécie de defesa terrível e empertigada do alto modernismo, e ele falava […] da arte que não seguia esses postulados modernistas como sendo teatro. E eu disse, “bingo, é isso, é isso mesmo”. A arte que importa agora é uma forma de teatro, e uma coisa que isso significa é ter de estar no mesmo espaço do espectador…” Martha Rosler, 1991.

A ideia determina a obra – Non relational

Malevich, Quadrado negro, 1915, óleo sobre tela, 80 x 80 cm

Lawrence Weiner installing A 36″ x 36″ REMOVAL TO THE LATHING OR SUPPORT WALL OF PLASTER OR WALLBOARD FROM A WALL, 1968; When Attitudes Become Form, Kunsthalle Bern, 1969
Site-specific refers to a work of art designed specifically for a particular location and that has an interrelationship with the location. If removed from the location it would lose all or a substantial part of its meaning. http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/s/site-specific

Non-composition
Ellsworth Kelly, Window, Museum of Modern Art, Paris, 1949, oil on wood and canvas, 2 joined panels, 128,3 x 49,5 x 1,9 cm
“Already made”
“Rather than making a picture that would be the interpretation of something I saw or the representation of an invented contents, I found an object and I presented it ‘as is’.”
“Everywhere I looked, everything I saw became something to be made, as is, without having to add anything whatever… There was no more need to compose.” Ellsworth Kelly, in: Foster; Krauss; Bois; Buchloh – Art Since 1900, p. 370

Ellsworth Kelly, Colors for a Large Wall, 1951, oil on canvas, 64 joined panels, 243,8 x 243,8 cm

Frank Stella, Jill, 1959

Robert Morris, Untitled (L-Beams), 1965-66.

Sol LeWitt, 122 Variations of Incomplete Open Cubes, 1974, (20,3 x 20,3 x 20,3 cm each)

Anthony Caro, Early One Morning, 1962, painted steel and aluminum, 289,6 x 619,8 x 335,3 cm

Sol LeWitt, 122 Variations of Incomplete Open Cubes, 1974

“Uma vez estabelecida a ideia de uma peça na mente do artista e decidida a sua forma final, o processo deve ser prosseguido cegamente. […] O processo é mecânico e não deve ser perturbado. Deve seguir o seu curso”. Sol LeWitt, Sentences on Conceptual Art, 1969.

Minimalism

Donald Judd, Sem título, 1969, cobre, altura total 292 cm

“Half or more of the best work in the last few years has been neither painting nor sculpture […] This work […] challenges both. […] The thing as a whole, its quality as a whole, is what is interesting”. Donald Judd, Specific Objects, 1965

Robert Morris, Threadwaste, 1968

Robert Morris, Felt, 1969 / 2014
Anti-form is a term associated with a group of artists working in the United States in the late 1960s who embraced chance and other organic processes in the creation of their minimal sculptures. Related to post-minimalism, anti-form sculptors worked from the principle that form should be derived from the inherent qualities of the chosen material. This differed from the approach of earlier minimalist sculptors who imposed order on their materials and confined themselves to fixed geometrical shapes and structures. http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/a/anti-form

 

Richard Serra, Gutter Corner Splash - Night Shift, 1969-1995, lead, 48,26 cm x 274,32 cm x 454,66 cm

Lynda Benglis painting a floor with 40 gallons of bright latex and pigments at the University of Rhode Island, 1969

Lynda Benglis, Quartered Meteor, 1969

Process art emphasizes the “process” of making art (rather than any predetermined composition or plan) and the concepts of change and transience, as elaborated in the work of such artists as Lynda Benglis, Eva Hesse, Robert Morris, Bruce Nauman, Richard Serra, Robert Smithson... http://www.guggenheim.org/new-york/collections/collection-online/movements/195233

 

Ready-made revisitado

Duchamp, Fountain, 1917

(Nouveau Realisme)

Daniel Spoerri, Kichka's breakfast, 1960, cadeira, copo, talheres, etc.

 

Piero Manzoni assinando uma mulher, 1961

Arman, convite para a exposição Le Plein, 1960 (Gal. Iris Clert, Paris), lata de sardinhas

Arman, Le Plein (Full-Up), Galerie Iris Clert, Paris, 1960, vista da instalação

 

Edward Kienholz, Roxys, 1960-61, 8 figures, furniture, juke box, clothes, etc.

Set in 1943, Roxy’s presents a life-size recreation of a well-known Las Vegas brothel. In a furnished room filled with objects and figures, Kienholz accurately displays the history and patina of the period—evoking the era of the artist’s adolescence—with vintage props such as a 1943 calendar, movie magazines, a juke box playing familiar songs from the forties, a slot machine, brand-name beer bottles and cigarette wrappers, a call-to-arms portrait of General MacArthur, period furniture, and miscellaneous bric-à-brac. The room is populated by disturbing, provocative figures that represent the remnants of human experience. This elaborately detailed tableau evokes the brutalities of the human condition: by offering an all-encompassing, visceral sensory experience, the viewer is fully and unavoidably confronted with the bleak realities of its subject matter. http://artdaily.com/news/37830/Edward-Kienholz-s-Renowned-Installation-Roxys--1960-61-at-David-Zwirner#.VVIxPdJ0zct   

 

Koons, New Hoover Convertibles, Green, Red, Brown, New Shelton WetDry 10 Gallon Displaced Doubledecker, 1981 – 1987. Vacuum cleaners, plexiglass, fluorescent lights

In 1980 Koons exhibited a series of sculptures comprising of wall-mounted vacuum cleaners displayed in Plexiglas cases. Over the next seven years the artist produced several more configurations, using readymade objects in the creation of highly conceptual artworks. Referred to broadly as ‘The New’ these works explored the way our fantasies and desires are transferred on to ordinary objects. Gleaming seductively under the glare of fluorescent lighting, it is the newness of the 'New Hoover Convertibles' that gives them their appeal. Suspended in a state of ultimate perfection, Koons commented "if one of my works was to be turned on, it would be destroyed." http://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/koons-new-hoover-convertibles-green-red-brown-new-shelton-wetdry-10-gallon-displaced-ar00077

 

Sherrie Levine, Fountain (after Marcel Duchamp), 1991, bronze, 38 x 63 x 38

Haim Steinbach, Charm of Tradition, 1985, plastic laminated wood shelf ,cotton, rubber nylon and leather athletic shoes

Rebecca Horn, Concert for Anarchy, 1990, painted wood, metal and electronic components, 150 x 106 x 155 cm

Danh Vo, Oma Totem, 2009

Tracey Emin, Everyone I have ever slept with, 1963-1995, tenda, colchão , etc., 122 x 245 x 215 cm

 

Arte como ideia – From appearance to conception

Conceptual artists do not set out to make a painting or a sculpture and then fit their ideas to that existing form. Instead they think beyond the limits of those traditional media, and then work out their concept or idea in whatever materials and whatever form is appropriate. They thus give the concept priority over the traditional media – hence conceptual art. http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/c/conceptual-art

Joseph Kosuth, One and Three Chairs, 1965-66, cadeira, 2 fotografias

“[The Readymade] changed the nature of art from a question of morphology to a question of function. This change – one from appearance to conception – was the beginning of modern art and the beginning of conceptual art…” | “Artists question the nature of art by presenting new propositions as to art’s nature.”  Joseph Kosuth, “Art After Philosophy”, 1969.

Joseph Kosuth, Titled (Art as Idea as Idea) (Universal), 1967, Photostat

Ed Ruscha, Twenty-six Gasoline Stations, 1962 (fragment)

Sol LeWitt, Buried Cube Containing an Object of Importance but Little Value, 1968

“Na arte conceptual a ideia ou conceito é o aspeto mais importante do trabalho. Quando um artista usa uma forma de arte conceptual, isso significa que todas as decisões e planeamento são decididas de antemão e que a execução é um aspeto a negligenciar. A ideia torna-se na máquina que faz a arte”. Sol LeWitt, “Paragraphs on Conceptual Art”, 1967

 

Douglas Huebler, Duration Piece #5, 1969

 

Arte como ideia – Palavra escrita

Magritte, O espelho mágico, 1929, óleo sobre tela, 73 x 55 cm

Sol LeWitt, Red Square, White Letters, 1963, oil on canvas, 91,4 x 91,4 cm

Yoko Ono, Painting For The Wind, 1961
Yoko Ono, Beat Piece, 1961

Robert Barry, Something Which is Very Near in Place and Time , But Not Yet Known to Me, 1969; installation view, 'When Attitudes Become Form', ICA, London, 1969

Lawrence Weiner, A Bit of Matter and a Little Bit More, 1976

Lawrence Weiner, As Long as it Lasts, c. 1993

 

Mel Ramsden (Art & Language), Secret Painting (Ghost), 1968, acrylic on canvas and Photostat

“The content of this painting in invisible; the character and dimension of the content are to be kept permanently secret, known only to the artist.”

 

Art-Language, Vol. 1, nº 1, 1969
Art-Language_vol. 3, nº 2, 1973

Art & Language, Index 01, 1972, 8 metal filing cabinets with texts and photostat wall display; Documenta 5, Kassel, 1972
Os arquivos continham os textos publicados na revista Art-Language e outros escritos de membros do grupo. Cada texto era relacionado com os restantes relativamente ao grau de compatibilidade entre ambos.

 

Edward Ruscha, Hollywood is a Verb, 1983

 

Arte como ideia – Tempo

 

On Kawara, obras de 1966, acrílico sobre tela

Roman Opalka (1931-2011), Detail, 196 x 135 cm
In 1965 Opałka began painting numbers from one to infinity. Starting in the top left-hand corner of the canvas and finishing in the bottom right-hand corner, the tiny numbers were painted in horizontal rows. Each new canvas took up counting where the last left off. The project had no definable end, and the artist pledged his life to its ongoing execution. Over the years there were changes to the process. First he painted white numbers onto a black background. In 1968 he changed to a grey background, and in 1972 he decided he would gradually lighten this grey background by adding 1 per cent more white to the ground with each passing detail. In 1968 Opałka introduced to the process a tape recorder, speaking each number into the microphone as he painted it, and also began taking passport-style photographs of himself standing before the canvas after each day's work. 

 

Novos espaços 1 – Expanded fields

Kurt Schwitters, Merzbau, c 1923

Michael Heizer, Double Negative, 1969-70, Nevada, Mormon Mesa

Robert Smithson, Partially Buried Woodshed, 1970
Partially Buried Woodshed – a non-monument to the process Smithson called “de-architecturization”.
“The law of entropy [thermodynamics] predicts the inevitable extinction of energy in any given system, the dissolution of any organization into a state of disorder and indifferentiation. […] Smithson was alone in making entropy the most important generative concept of art practice at the end of the sixties…” Foster; Krauss; Bois; Buchloh. Art Since 1900…, 2004, p. 505, 506.

 

Gordon Matta-Clark, Splitting, 1974, casa cortada transversalmente, vista exterior e interior

Gordon Matta Clark, Conical Intersect, 1974 (Paris)
“Gordon Matta-Clark (1943–1978), who trained originally as an architect, is best known for his spectacular ‘building cuts’. These have often been seen as an outright rejection of the architectural profession. The collaborative project Anarchitecture (1974), however, demonstrates how the language of modernism, particularly the polemical and epigrammatic Towards a New Architecture by the French modernist artist and architect Le Corbusier, was very much part of his raw material. […] The term Anarchitecture, expressing as it does a creative tension between Apollonian and Dionysian opposites, has come to summarise many of the concerns explored by Matta-Clark during his brief career”. http://www.tate.org.uk/research/publications/tate-papers/towards-anarchitecture-gordon-matta-clark-and-le-corbusier

Doris Salcedo, Shibboleth I, 2007, installation view, Tate Modern

 

Novos espaços

 

Walter de Maria, New York Earth Room, 1977

Richard Long, South Bank Circle, 1991

 

Giuseppe Penone, Tree of 12 Metres, 1980-2

Tree of 12 Metres was made by scraping away the wood from a felled tree, which had first been roughly sawn into a beam, to reveal its internal structure of narrow core and developing branches. Penone's aim was to return the tree to the form it had had at an earlier stage of its growth, making visible natural processes which are normally hidden. He made the first of his Albero or Tree works in 1969. http://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/penone-tree-of-12-metres-t05557

Alberto Carneiro, Os bambus com vinte e uma imagens do teu ser imaginante, canas da Índia, ráfia, espelhos com texto manuscrito

 

Novos espaços 3

“A Sculpture by Richard Long, Wiltshire, 12-15 October 1969 | Each square drawn on the map was walked separately and as accurately as possible, without rehearsal. | The total walking time for each square is given.”

Hamish Fulton, The Pilgrim’s Eay, 1971

“Since the early 1970s Hamish Fulton has been labelled as a sculptor, photographer, Conceptual artist and Land artist. Fulton, however, characterises himself as a ‘walking artist’. […] In 1973 […] Fulton decided to ‘only make art resulting from the experience of individual walks’.” http://www.tate.org.uk/whats-on/tate-britain/exhibition/hamish-fulton-walking-journey
“My art is about specific places and particular events that are not present in the gallery. The given information is very minimal. My hope is that the viewer will create a feeling, an impression in his or her own mind, based on whatever my art can provide”. Hamish Fulton

 

Ana Mendieta, Tree of Life, 1979
Using her own body, together with elemental materials such as blood, fire, earth and water, Ana Mendieta creates visceral performances and ephemeral ‘earth-body’ sculptures that combine ritual with metaphors about life, death, rebirth and spiritual transformation. http://www.southbankcentre.co.uk/whatson/festivals-series/ana-mendieta  
“I decided that for the images to have magic qualities I had to work directly with nature. I had to go to the source of life, to mother earth.” Ana Mendieta

 

Novos espaços 4

Hans Haacke, Condensation Cube, 1963

Walter de Maria, Lightening Field, 1977

 

In 1974, James Turrell conceived of a project for a natural setting that would extend his explorations of light and space from the studio into the western landscape. After an extensive search, Turrell was able to arrange the purchase of Roden Crater in 1977.
“At Roden Crater I was interested in taking the cultural artifice of art out into the natural surround. I did not want the work to be a mark upon nature, but I wanted the work to be enfolded in nature in such a way that light from the sun, moon and stars empowered the spaces … “. http://rodencrater.com/about

James Turrell, Skyspace, (anos de 1970)

 

Desmaterialização

John Neff, Performing 4'33" by John Cage at Suitable, silver gelatin print

John Cage, 4” 33’, 1952 – The piece consists of four minutes and thirty-three seconds in which the performer plays nothing. It was first performed by the young pianist David Tudor at Woodstock, New York, on August 29, 1952

“People began whispering to one another, and some people began to walk out. They didn't laugh - they were just irritated when they realized nothing was going to happen, and they haven't forgotten it 30 years later: they're still angry”. John Cage

Yves Klein, Le Vide (O Vazio), 1958, vista da instalação, Galeria Iris Clert, Paris

“Recently my work with color has led me, in spite of myself, to search little by little, with some assistance (from the observer, from the translator), for the realization of matter, and I have decided to end the battle. My paintings are now invisible and I would like to show them in a clear and positive manner, in my next Parisian exhibition at Iris Clert’s”. Yves Klein

 

Yves Klein, Transfer of Zones of Immaterial Pictorial Sensibility, 1962

Robert Irwin, Untitled, 1971

James Turrell, St. Elmos Light, 2013

Martin Creed, Work No 227 Lights Going On and Off, 2000, instalação, Tate Britain

 

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