Page 21 - Studio International - May 1972

The newer art never an element in sCulpture before kinetic Time is the differenCe. Also, it can't be repeated.
sculpture, and then in kinetic sCulpture the time If it's repeated then it becomes theatre.
was very short. Sculptures put on a performance PJ What about videotapes. They repeat events.
Tom Marioni but they repeated themselves, and when they TM Videotapes are records. They record the
in conversation with repeated themselves, they became theatre. Now action of the artist. They can't be easily edited
Prudence Juris it isn't repeated. It is a single experience, so that and deal with real time. Videotape is a record
makes it more real. Nothing is wrong with of a work.
illusion. It's just that it doesn't have anything to PJ Only ?
do with sculpture, and that's what the Museum TM It's done so that it can look differently, it
of Conceptual Art is, it's a sculpture museum. depends on how it is used. Bruce Nauman uses
PJ What do you think is happening to museums videotape as a medium in itself to set up
today ? psychologiCal situations. Terry Fox uses video
TM Two things. One, because of the economy, as a tool to record his work for history.
museums are having money trouble. The PJ Since conCeptual artists don't usually make
museums are using state or federal money to objects that they can sell, how will they support
operate, and if they did things that were too far themselves ?
out the public would think that they were TM Collectors are going to have to pay an artist
wasting taxpayers' money. But it's the museum's for the first-hand experience of his work. In
responsibility to educate the public, and the way other words, an artist performs a work first for a
you educate the public is to give them what they colleCtor. Then the collector can consider he owns
don't already know. that work since he paid for its produCtion. He
Prudence Juris : What is art ? Another thing: unless they figure out a way to experienced it first, and was responsible for it.
Tom Marioni : A poetic recording of the culture promote art without caring only for objeCts they He can have a videotape, photographs, or some
with style. will find that they are becoming historical documentation of the work that he can resell.
PJ What is conCeptual art ? institutions, because contemporary art deals with Eventually videotapes will beCome like
TM Idea-oriented art that's not directed toward real time and real people. multiples, they will increase in value. You can
the production of a static object. There are three Actually, it is becoming impossible for copy them, but the quality is less.
kinds of conceptual art. There's language museums to deal with Contemporary art, beCause PJ Like reproductions ?
artists, who use language to create imaginary contemporary artists are revolutionaries. SinCe TM Yes, so the mastertape is like having an
space, there are artists who use mathematics to we are in a time of revolution, in order to deal original work of art. The machine can tell if it is
do the same thing, who are like purists, and with real life, real time, one must break the original so you can authenticate the tape from a
then there is Conceptual art, that's performance rules ... break the rules of life. A public technician.
sculpture, where the element of time has been institution that people pay for isn't going to PJ Do you think the public is becoming more
added to sculpture. support artists who break the law. The only way receptive ?
PJ Why did you start the Museum of Conceptual museums can deal with contemporary art is to TM Art is more philosophiCal. It demands that
Art? break the law, or to support artists who break the the public be more philosophical about their
TM It's an outlet for contemporary art and law, if they are dealing with Contemporary perceiving art. It seems less visual and more
there wasn't another outlet here for problems. idea-oriented, and requires more thought
contemporary art. Conceptual art is PJ You are going to have to qualify that, because process. You learn about the time. Like in
contemporary art to me. It's modern art. Artists otherwise you would be saying to break the law, minimal sCulpture. People related to that like
record their art poetically since we live in a time any law, was to be an artist. You have to put it they did to music. Before rock music you heard
of planned obsolescenCe. in the right context. only with your ears. Then rock musiC developed
PJ How's your museum different from any other TM Breaking the law isn't art. Breaking the law at the same time as minimal sculpture, and
museum ? poetically is art. Hijacking an airplane done people listened with their whole bodies. The
TM It deals with modern art and the others poetically, with style, is done in a sculptural way. volume was so intense you took it into your skin.
don't. Others don't want to deal with artists, It deals with transformation of elements and is The same thing happened to sculpture. You felt
and artists are an important element in their very sculptural. it with your whole body.
work. • PJ But if someone doesn't intend it to be art or PJ You mean environmental sCulpture.
PJ Does that mean that any object that an artist sculpture, but simply a hijacking, is it art ? TM Environmental sCulpture grew out of
does is not modern art ? TM The guy might not have understood minimal sculpture. It dealt with arChitectural
TM No. Objects are used, but objeCts are used sculptural problems, but I'm sure he delighted scale, and became large enough to become part
as elements in the proCess. BeCause art is the act in the process and saw this as an artistiC event. of it. The artist himself beCame a material in this
of creation and the aCt of the process, the process PJ How is performanCe different from theatre ? work.
is the subject and the objects can only be parts, TM For a lot of reasons. One is that in PJ Didn't Abstract Expressionism also play a part
not ends. The end is the proCess. Because the performanCe sculpture the interaCtion of artists in its development ?
culture moves so fast it is impossible to make with their materials is direCt. He relates forms to TM Abstract Expressionism was the beginning
anything that isn't dated as soon as it's finished. himself or other forms in performance in a way of the artists involvement with his body
It has to be either ongoing or deal with real time. that traditional sculpture related one form to physically. You see the movement of the arm in
It can't deal with edited time. Objects are edited, another. The differenCe is that the forms aren't the painting. Art became anti-intelleCtual
compressed time. It's an illusion. static. They are Changing. That element of time beCause the concern was with the physicality of
PJ What's wrong with that ? is there too. In theatre there is a juxtaposition of the painting.
TM Nothing's wrong with that, it just isn't real. elements of form, but the intent is that the PJ So you think that conceptual art is a
PJ But what is real ? audience be convinced that the elements are revolutionary aspect.
TM A sculpture deals with real time, and theatre part of a story line. In theatre it is Compressed TM Yes. Conceptual art is a major break in the
deals with illusionary time. Time is in time. A period of six months can take place in beginning of modern art. Because it leaves the
sculpture like form was. SCulpture used to be two hours, but in sculpture, two hours is two object. It is the most significant jump in art in
only form, not its form and time. Time was hours. It is real time, it isn't an illusion. the history of art. q
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