QUOTE - Eva Hesse

Untitled statement (1968)  

in Eva Hesse (New York: Fischbach Gallery, 1968)

"I would like the work to be non-work. This means that it would find its way beyond my preconceptions. (...)"

Untitled statement (1969) 

in Art in Process IV (Finch College, 1969)

"(...) I remember I wanted to get to non art, non connotive, non anthropomorphic, non geometric, non, nothing, everything, but of another kind, vision, sort. from a total reference point. is it possible? I have learned anything is possible. I know that."

EVENT- Duets on ice, Laurie Anderson and Jane Crawford at the Barbican

Laurie Anderson, Trisha Brown and Gordon Matta-Clark: Pioneers of the downtown scene New York 1970's. This exhibition at the Barbican in London is accompanied by an excellent series of live performances and events, the first of which was Duets on ice. For more info about the programme of events and the exhibition itself, visit the Barbican website or here.


Thu 3 Mar 2011


6.30pm- Gallery Talk
Jane Crawford, film-maker and director of the Estate of Gordon Matta-Clark, discusses the significance and influence of the innovative New York alternative space 112 Greene Street on Matta-Clark and his peers.


In the 1970's, vast areas of lower Manhattan in New York  were empty. Industries moved out of the city, there was a mistrust in the government, high rates of unemployment and crime, the many anti-Vietnam war protest marches. In a city faced with an economic crisis, a group of artists (painters sculptors dancers filmakers musicians) began occupying the large empty factory spaces in SoHo, transforming them into studios in where to work and live. Artists shared spaces, helped each other and collaborated in projects that were experimental and valued new ideas of process over the finished outcome. The streets and the factory spaces were used as setting for the work, because they were empty and for free.  The white cube gallery space  in where to show and sell the work became innapropriate and redudant for these artists creating artwork impossible to sell. Art was for artsake, not for money.

The 112 Green Street Gallery opened to give home to this new ideology. The space was bought by Jeffrey Lew and was used by the emerging SoHo vibrant art community to show a kind of art that nobody was  interested in. There wasn't a programme of exhibitions or a curator in charge. Artwork went up and was taken down by the artists themselves who agreed in advance who was going to show and when. 112 Green Street allowed artists be free to create, explore and experiment  new ideas. Collaboration and cross over of artforms: dancers versus artists dancers, filmakers versus artists filmakers.

Look also at : FOOD (artist run restaurant), Avalanche (magazine), Anarchitecture group, Alan Saret, Richard Serra, Vito Acconci, Robert Morris, Richard Nonas, Trisha Brown, Yvonne Reiner, Judson Group, Dan Graham, Lawrence Weiner, Bruce Nauman, Bruce McLean, Barry Le Va....

8pm- Duets on Ice

Laurie Anderson performs one of her earliest works Duets on Ice (1974–75), an intimate performance with violin, recorded accompaniment and ice skates.

SHOWS- Angelhead Hipsters, the photographs of Allen Ginsberg

At the National Theatre in London.

" The poignancy of a photograph comes from looking back to a fleeting moment in a floating world."- Allen Ginsberg 1990



L-R: Lucien Carr, Jack Kerouac, Allen Ginsberg and William Burroughs




William Burroughs




Allen Ginsberg and Gregory Corso




Patti Smith and William Burroughs



EVENT- Patti Smith in conversation with Geoff Dyer

On the 25th January 2011 at the Royal Geographical Society in London.

More info here.

Patti Smith performing "My Blakean Year", at the end of the conversation.

My artwork - Statement in progress

The work aims at experimenting with ideas and concepts.
The work seeks to be honest, personal and simple.
The work follows a process.
The work derives from chance.
The work is open to the exploration of non-precious and non-traditional materials.
The work does not seek to be aesthetically pleasing.
The work derives from what´s outside my mind.
The work is beyond my control.

AV 9.1.11

READING 004 - The Andy Warhol Diaries

"Tuesday, June 28, 1977 (...) I haven´t peed on any canvases this week. This is for the Piss paintings. I told Ronnie [Ronnie Cutrone] not to pee when he gets up in the morning- to try to hold it until he gets to the office, because he takes lots of vitamin B so the canvas turns a really pretty color when it´s his piss. (...)"

INFLUENCES 001

Female Brazilian avant-garde artists working in the 1960´s-70´s
Using the format of the box and the book as restricted and contained vehicles.

Mira Schendel

Untitled, 1960
Image from www.moma.org

Lygia Clark

Unidade series, 1958

Anna Maria Maiolino

Trajectoria I, 1976
Image from http://cadernosafetivos.blogspot.com/



Lygia Pape

Livro da Criação, 1959
Image from http://cadernosafetivos.blogspot.com

ARTE POVERA

'The name means literally 'poor art' but the word poor here refers to the movement's signature exploration of a wide range of materials beyond the quasi-precious traditional ones of oil paint on canvas, or bronze, or carved marble. Arte Povera therefore denotes not an impoverished art, but an art made without restraints, a laboratory situation in which any theoretical basis was rejected in favour of a complete openness towards materials and processes.' - www.tate.org.uk/collections/glossary/definition.jsp?entryId=31

WATCHING- Painters Painting by Emile de Antonio, 1972

Documentary which focuses on the American art world between 1946-70. Artists such as Robert Rauchenberg, Willem de Kooning, Barnett Newman, Jasper Jones speak about their work and the world that revolves around it. Only part of the documentary shown here.- http://www.ubu.com/film/deantonio_painters.html

I have recently found a copy of the book "New York Painting and Sculpture: 1940-1970" by Henry Geldzahler in a charity shop. This book is a perfect complement for this doucmentary. In fact Geldzahler (Curator of Contemporary Art at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, at the time) also features in this documentary.

WATCHING- Ways of Seeing by John Berger

'Ways of Seeing was a BBC television series consisting of visual essays that raise questions about hidden ideologies in visual images. The series gave rise to a later book of the same name written by John Berger.' - http://www.ubu.com/film/berger_seeing1.html