Page 48 - Studio International - January 1972
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New York                                  in a very raisonnable fashion. He offers his   the old overemphasis on experience of a sensible

                                               programme in pithy statements at the very   order. Sensibility is not enough, they seem to
     commentary:                               beginning, the first being his disclaimer of   be saying, you must understand objective
                                               being an artist CI have been presenting works   thought as it is being explored by
     Abracadabrizing                           which were not works of art') and the next being   mathematicians and logicians. The idea is to

                                               the contradictory evidence of his coquetry with   create, as Buren suggested in his essay last year
     art                                       art : 'The art was existing only on a propositional   in Studio International, scientifically and
                                               and conceptual level.' To which he might have   theoretically. The issue is (as it always was),
     Dore Ashton                               added, 'And because museums, art galleries   what constitutes creation ? I submit that
                                               and other surfeited agencies were only too   pointing, or even choosing, requires no creation,
                                               glad to have something to exhibit that did not   but only intellection. The invasion of museums
                                               require the troublesome sifting and rumination   with information theory placards represents a
                                               the work of art demands.'                 cultivated choice of topical ideas. The docent
                                                 Venet from the outset abrogated his rights   on this trip through current intellectual events
                                               as a creator, with pride. 'My work is a manifesto   can at times be entertaining, original, even
                                               against aesthetics, against the expression of the   shocking (which borders on the aesthetic),
                                               individual's personality'. The manifesto takes   but he cannot infuse his 'works' with the smell
                                               the didactic form of instructive placards   of creation.
                                               covering a number of fields that interest Venet,   Venet's activities enter into the general
                                               ranging from astrophysics to meta-mathematics.   discourse circulating around the proposition
                                               His is the schoolmasterish pointing (with the   that the object of art need not be an object, with
                                               same dogmatic fervour those chalk-wielders   its corollary that it ought not to have style.
                                               often have) to which so many Americans have   Anti-object activities, pursued by those who
                                               become so accustomed. Eat this, drink that,   variously regard themselves as artists or anti-
                                               fly here, fly there, and now, on that more   artists, range fairly wide. Almost always those
                                               exalted plane: think deep. It's good for you,   activities require discourse (manifestoes and
                                               and good for art.                         disclaimers), and almost always the discourse
                                                 Unquestionably Venet points well. His mind   flirts with philosophy. The Polish artist Tadeusz
                                               in its magpie activities has alighted on the most   Kantor has always had a penchant for
                                               serious and innovative activities in the world   philosophical discourse, although in recent
                                               of intellectual endeavour. But of course, it only   years his thunderbolt has become more and
                                               alights, which seems  to be enough to warrant a   more abbreviated. Not long ago he issued
                                               life's work of five years, and enough to warrant   another group of notes centring on the
                                               the serious consideration of all those intellectuals   completion of a great replica of a folding chair
                                               who are only too happy to colonize the realm   in Scandinavia. Kantor's reduction of terms
                                               of sensibilities, a realm which has always been   goes like this : 'A work without form,
                                               difficult of access to them. Venet, and other   without aesthetic values, without perception,
                                               conceptualists, open the purlieus of bohemia   impossible, or possible only through creative
                                               to all sorts of intellectuals who are thrilled to   activity ! A work that expresses nothing, doesn't
                                               make the liaison. They, too, must have a   act, communicates nothing, isn't even a
                                               deathwish, for the substitution of the didactic   testimony or a reproduction, doesn't refer to
     The Hebrew source, abreq ad hâbra, of that   placard for the book is a serious deviation. The   reality, or a spectator, or even the author, is
     euphonious magic formula abracadabra, can   book has been in danger for a long time. As a   impermeable to exterior penetration, turned
     be translated as : 'Hurl your thunderbolt even   publisher said to me recently, for this generation   nowhere toward nothing, being only the void,
     unto death.' What with all the endgames,   in their teens, we're going to have to find   a hole in reality without destination, which
     huis clos, assaults on sensibility, and assaults on   something else. Venet's catalogue raisonné   leaves the sacred terrain they have reserved for
     insensibility to which our century (and the   perhaps ?                             it without seeking rationalization, which (quite
     one before it) has been subjected, it would seem   This is decidedly something else, and it is   simply) is, which by the sole fact of its auto-
     that the literal meaning of abracadabra has   something else than art, as Venet insists. Who   existence puts all the environing reality into
     been faithfully followed. Each time the   can resist asking then, but what is it ? It   an unreal situation (one would say
     thunderbolt seems to have been hurled even   appears that most commentators can resist   "artistic") . .
     unto death. And each time it miraculously   since they are not sure, and can no longer state   Kantor, who I suspect cannot help being an
     recharges itself; like a movie in reverse, only to   confidently : I don't know what I like but I   artist, winds up with an artistic proposition of
     repeat its abracadabra.                   know what art is. If a conceptualist comes along,   considerable power — a gigantic replica of a
       The latest event in this history of finales is   points briefly at a geometric theorem, or   folding chair in a landscape, with all the
     the retrospective exhibition of the conceptual   linguistic diagram, waggles his finger and says,   imaginative possibilities that offers. But he has
     artist ( ?), or perhaps conceptualist is a better   You ought to know about this, is this art ? Is   not escaped the abracadabra trap of ceaseless
     word, Bernar Venet at the NEW YORK CULTURAL   this science ? Is this pedagogy ? Is this manifestly   finales. No form, no meaning, the delicious
     CENTER. With considerable relish the museum   a manifesto against bourgeois art ? Or is it a   void — a quest as wearying, finally, as the quest
     has mounted the five years' production    kind of intellectual dandyism ? I'm inclined to   for meaning.
     announcing Venet's retirement as an artist, and   think of it as dandyism, although I recognize   Where Kantor's need for the word is always
     simultaneously issuing a catalogue raisonne.   the modest medicinal properties such activities   linked to his guilty fabrication of some thing,
     Venet is the art historian's ideal subject since   undeniably possess. That is, there can be a   whether a performance or an object, the pure
     at the age of thirty he has completed his life's   temporary relief from the headache of   conceptualists are totally dependent on the
     oeuvre, so he says, and can now be classified   aesthetics when your mind is directed cleverly   word and printing and communications codes.
     permanently. He himself is eminently co-  to intellectual pursuits. Venet and the squads   They seem fatally attracted to the old
     operative, having planned his catalogue raisonné    of conceptualists in every city are pitted against    Mallarméan dream of The Book. Unlike

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