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What is the object of art—what is the art object? We might begin by trying to describe the evolution of abstraction in art, or work plus words. Mallarmé and Apollinaire were poets who experimented with graphic elements in revolutionary ways. They were precursors of successive evolutions responding to and advancing the forms that led to contemporary art in the guise of signs in the public sphere—public address systems. Futurists, Constructivists and Dadaists, through the 1910s and early 20s each gave distinctive and political vectors to the use of typography and design for the purposes of art. |
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WORD: Thought Things – L. Brandon Krall
What is the object of art—what is the art object? We might begin by trying to describe the evolution of abstraction in art, or work plus words. Mallarmé and Apollinaire were poets who experimented with graphic elements in revolutionary ways. They were precursors of successive evolutions responding to and advancing the forms that led to contemporary art in the guise of signs in the public sphere—public address systems. Futurists, Constructivists and Dadaists, through the 1910s and early 20s each gave distinctive and political vectors to the use of typography and design for the purposes of art. The paradigm changes were spelled out by both Malraux and Benjamin in their well-known texts of the late 30s and early 40s, bridging the perceptual gap between “popular” and “high” arts, uniting the grassroots with the ivory towers of cultural production.
Culture marks the evolution of human undertakings, it might be described as an accretion of realized projects, and it records all the stages in the diversity of developing sects through the things generated. But, even if every decade could overtly express an ebullient multiplicity such as that which blossomed explosively in the Americas, Europe and Asia in the 60s and 70s, it would still be impossible to describe the magnitude of confluences and admixtures that took place among the arts at that time. In the late 60s, Mel Bochner observed, “There is no idea without material support,” and the first generation of artists who were called Conceptualists began to reduce, to its essences, the object of art (individual perception/experience) and the art object (ideas/processes). Perhaps just a list of titles or the names of individuals and groups would make it possible to address the abundance of fertile work of this variety. Perhaps reading a table of contents, an index or chronology out loud; or doing something along the lines of Lucy Lippard’s book, “Six Years: The dematerialization of the art object from 1966 to 1972: a cross-reference book of information on some esthetic boundaries: consisting of a bibliography into which are inserted a fragmented text, art works, documents, interviews, and symposia, arranged chronologically and focused on so-called conceptual or information or idea art with mentions of such vaguely designated areas as minimal, anti-form, systems, earth, or process art, occurring now in the Americas, Europe, England, Australia, and Asia (with occasional political overtones…).”
“WORD” surveys work made of words, putting art again in the service of the mind. Ideas and their embodiments range from abstraction, to wordplay and verbal constructs tied to figurative objects by artists who engage language and ideas as their medium. Both current and historical, the show includes a rare video of Marcel Broodthaers in 1972 at Speaker’s Corner performing/demonstrating with a slate board, new posters, catalogs and books by Arakawa/Gins, and the billboard IMAGINE PEACE by Yoko Ono on a major highway in Houston. In this exhibition, diverse artists from first and second generation Conceptualists to Fluxus artists from France, to artists from across North America, including an important selection of Texans, are brought together. “WORD” is in all three of the large spaces of the new Deborah Colton Gallery, which is just entering into its third year. The gallery is a highly ambitious vehicle that projects the visionary intentions of its founder and namesake, bringing contemporary art from around the world to the Texas art community.
