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Martin’s Creed and The Condition of Music
L. Brandon Krall
Work No. 112: Thirty-nine metronomes beating time, one at every speed
“I want all my works to be equal, big or small, a piece of music, a
sculpture, an installation, or a painting. I want them to be treated
the same – giving them all a number was one way of trying to do that,”
says Creed in regards to his informal approach. “I want to try to see
what I think. I think trying is a big part of it, I think thinking is a
big part of it, and I think wanting is a big part of it. But saying it
is difficult,” adds Creed. “I want what I say to go without saying.” Ad
Reinhardt may have put it best when he said, “an artist…has always
nothing to say, and he must say this over and over again—especially in
his work. What else is there to say? “
In order to truly appreciate Creed’s installations and objects, one must experience them first hand. Bard College’s Hessel Museum of Art and Center for Curatorial Studies has made this possible with Creed’s first North American survey opened under one roof titled Feelings. Curated by Trevor Smith, the presentation of Creed’s work garners his minimalist reputation with his playful simplicity and thought-provoking installations. The delight of spirited livingness in Work No. 570, People running at intervals through the museum intervention, reinvigorates the experience of a museum context. Creed chose a fascinating selection of excellent works from the Marieluise Hessel Collection to exhibit with his own (e.g., Richard Long’s Little Tejunga Canyon Circle with Creed’s Work No. 127: Lights going on and off). A variety of musical and sound works include Work No. 372 where the lid and music stand of a Bechstein baby grand piano falls at intervals. The entrance to the Hessel Museum installation contains Work No. 628: Half the air in a given space made of a massing of 16” blue balloons through which one has to pass in order to enter the galleries. Outside the museum people of all ages played with a few escaped balloons, which bears testimony to the work’s extended appeal. Work No. 122: All the sounds on a drum played one after the other, in their given order, at a speed which makes the piece last for one minute is not easy to hear over the wonderful clicking that the arrayed Work No. 112: Thirty-nine metronomes beating time, one at every speed. Outside on the Hessel and CCS grounds is planted Work No. 785, ACER palmatum ‘Coorara Pygmy’, MALUS ‘Adirondack’, PARROTIA persica, CARPINUS betulus ‘Columnaris’, QUERCUS robur ‘Fastigiata’ consisting of five trees in heights ranging from 2 feet to 24 feet, which, when viewed from the inside, is framed by a window of an otherwise empty room.
In a rolling Scottish brogue, punctuated by a few tremors of laughter, Creed describes growing up in a house full of pianos, guitars, flutes, recorders, and violin. His training included musical notation (he always writes his music down), and his grandmother, Irene Creed, was an awarded concert pianist. He lived with his parents and a brother a year older, in the suburbs of Glasgow about an hour from Edinburgh, the capital of Scotland. Finding art particularly engaging since boyhood, by the age of 12 he knew that whatever he did in life it would involve art making. The family traveled often to Germany, always visiting museums and Kunsthalles, his father insisted that they engage in constructive activity. Asked about the influence of ‘social sculpture’ in his work Creed remembered a strong impression on him made by the work of Joseph Beuys at Documenta in 1987, and he bought his first artwork, a felt postcard.
When Creed moved to London to attend the Slade School of Art, he recalls giving more attention to literature, to music of course, which he played with his band at the time, and to TV, Faulty Towers and Samuel Beckett’s plays were shown regularly. He purposely kept the main-stream developments in art distant from his thought process while developing his own trajectory. Creed likes zingy art, with a zed… work that is not like mine. And when asked recently what advise he would give to young artists today, he had later thought to say, “…do what you are scared of, let go of control.”
Creed is a collector, a hunter – gatherer, who refines and reduces his discoveries to their basic elements. He arranges, catalogs and numbers, all kinds of desired effects thus exposed. Recently drunk on Freedom beer, he walks a line between unique works, like, Work No. 142: A large piece of furniture partially obstructing a door, (which can be done with any piece of furniture chosen for any doorway) editions and multiples, like the recording of Be Natural, that you can download from his website.
London is his home city, but Martin loves Rome, Milan and New York. Currently he is listening to American country music, because it is a bit melancholy, but his identification with punk’s rough simplicity, tear it up and do it yourself attitude remains intact, and he lives on the Sicilian island of Alicudi when he can find time to go to his house by the sea.
