Page 19 - Studio Internatinal - October 1974

"INCREDIBLE" BELGIUM: IMPRESSIONS

BARBARA REISE

Before I had ever been in Belgium, I knew Broodthaers/Daniel Buren/Victor Burgin/Gilbert which returned the image of the viewer in the
some Belgians. Other than Hercule Poirot, & George/On Kawara/Gerhard Richter' at the room — before a video-tape was added later
whose Belgianness I'd barely noticed in the Palais de Beaux-Arts (Paleis van Schone which showed the entrance of a camel (as
novels of Agatha Christie, they were mostly Kunsten) in January 1974. That trip really viewer) to the exhibition.
members of the international avant-garde art blew my mind — I had surrealistic dreams and So were we all like camels? No, rather like
world: Herman and Nicole Daled, Fernand fantasies for a week — and the potency of the sheep. For after the very friendly party in this
Spillemaeckers, Marcel Broodthaers and Maria experience was due more to the social aesthetics exhibition (good booze, thank you), everyone
Gil issen. I had also been receiving information around and after the exhibition than to the transported themselves along to Le Bailli
about the activities of the Wide White Space, character of the work exhibited. But first where six little galleries were holding a joint
Plus Kern, X-One, and MTL galleries for some things first: the show. My first impression of (and jointly advertised) vernissage neatly timed
years — at my request. And I'd heard jokes the exhibition was like seeing a variety of gems to begin as the drinks at the 'big' exhibition
about the benefit of trans-Europe super- carefully and sympathetically and diplomatically ended — and, in one case, neatly showing work
highways allowing people to pass through selected and set in more than enough breathing by one of seven 'big' artists, Carl Andre. By this
Belgium without stopping, and stories of space. My last impressions are not much time the crowd of dealers, critics, artists and
Belgian collectors — their arriving at the different. Given the range of possible choices in artists' friends who had come from throughout
Cologne Kunstmarkt with hats, gloves, and international avant-garde art, the seven artists
shopping lists of international artists' names, allowed to do their bit were by this time the
and their chartering a plane to New York City equivalent of gilt-edged stocks and — treated
to try and buy 'a Jan Dibbets' from Leo with sympathy — certain to make work of a
Castelli. And I'd heard of Dutch and German comprehensible and visually pleasing nature. Or
and Belgian galleries renting spaces in Brussels' at least not to make rude shocks, messy floors,
Le Bailli and in Antwerp, treating them as a or seemingly immaterial (and unsaleable)
sort of shop-window or suburban shopping- things. (The closest to this last was the verbal
centre for their activities. Then I'd been invited statements of Burgin — which, compared with
to a July 1973 conference of international those not exhibited by Arnatt, Art Language,
artists and Belgian scientists, economists, and Weiner, or Barry, still participate in that well-
philosophers at Deurle, in such vague terms and polished easiness characteristic of the whole
confusing addresses that I did not go. (Later I show.) And with the exception of On Kawara
heard that I missed nothing but frustration: the and Marcel Broodthaers, all the artists responded
expected conference hall in Deurle was not to the sympathetic treatment by Yves Gevaert
available, nor were the specialists in fields other (two paid trips to work 'on site', financial
than art: the three-day Brussels meeting was as assistance to realize the work, an honorarium,
marked by heat and boredom as it was by a free hand to create another work in the
unfulfillment of earlier plans.) For nine months catalogue) by presenting works in the image of
afterwards my morning post presented the their past styles with such elegance, monument-
internecine war among the three galleries which ality, and perfection that they were boring to
had organized Deurle — in letters whose any thought process other than arguments on
sequence and interrelation was startlingly the foot-note scale of connoisseurship in
irregular, but whose message was clear: the traditional aesthetics. In the context of this
integrity and reputation of the various dealers artificial respiration, On Kawara's personal
was in question amongst themselves, and this non-participation other than a late announcement
questioning was construed as being of inter- by telegram that 'I am still alive' (reproduced
national relevance — in short, it was a with scrupulous honesty in the catalogue) was a
competition for the respect and further breath of fresh air. Marcel Broodthaers' Jardin
participation of international artists for whose d'Hiver was more: a truly new work in his
work a local market was assumed. It all sounded historical oeuvre which not only extended the
like a group of hungry salesmen circling around notion of 'museum' to include nineteenth-
a rather rich and fat client who had shown century jardins botaniques, jardins zoologiques,
signs of new-born interest and naivety: that and Museums of Natural History — in short,
(Top) View of rooms G1. G2 & G3 of the Palajs de
client was the Belgian private collectors who, nature — but also accentuated the hot-house Beaux-Arts in january 1974 showing Carl Andre's 67
after perhaps a decade of inactivity, are 'conservatory' atmosphere of the other Copper Cardinals on the floor, Daniel Buren's Peinture
Horizontal above (replacing the plain canvas of the
beginning to compete with their German and exhibition(s) by alluding to that favourite pre-
light-adjusting dropped-ceiling with his printed-striped
Italian predecessors in the possession of war bourgeois meeting place, the Palm Court — canvases with the middle white stripes covered with
international (and largely American) avant- where potted palms masked small white acrylic paint). Through the far door one can see
part of Marcel Broodthaer's Jardin d'Hiver. One cannot
garde art. conversational areas and sentimental violins see on the side walls the Inca Pisca photo-sculpture by
So much for the impressions of Belgium I charmed the ear during polite refreshments on, Gilbert and George, the borrowed-from-a-museum
received abroad. They were not irrelevant to say, coffee and cakes. As an 'installation' it was paintings by On Kawara, or the entrance to the small
room showing Victor Burgin's statements from his
those I received on my first trip — a thirty-six devastatingly witty in itself: and that it was a
(also exhibited) book. Photo: Y. Gevaert
hour Brussels quickie for the exhibition and comment on the viewer's experience within the
(Bottom) Partial view of Marcel Broodthaer's Jardin
opening festivities of 'Carl Andre/Marcel exhibition was underlined by the TV screen d'Hiver. (Photo: Y. Gevaert)
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