August 7, 2003
©Charles Giuliano

Gretchen Bender and Bill T. Jones (US), Joseph Beuys (Germany), Tania Bruguera (Cuba), Lygia Clark (Brazil), Cai Guo-Qiang (China/US), Felix Golzalez-Torres (Cuba/US), Irene and Christine Hohenbuchler (Austria), Leonilson (Brazil), Wolfgang
Laib (Germany), David Medella (Phillipines/UK), Ernesto Neto (Brazil), Hannah Wilkie (US), Richard Yarde (US)

Catalogue, 127 pages, with essays by Morgan, Jill Medvedow (introduction by ICA director), Thierry Davila, Sander L. Gilman, Sandra Alvarez de Toledo, Gwendolyn DuBois Shaw, Stephanie Molinard and Emily Moore 

The Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston
May 14 through August 31


There is some irony that I am writing about the healing powers of art on such an infamous date, August 7. It was on this day that the United States dropped an atomic bomb on the Japanese City of Hiroshima. So, on the grim anniversary of unleashing that most devastating force of human destruction and suffering, it is daunting and sobering to discuss the role of the artist as shaman, therapist and healer.

It is not inappropriate to start with the notion of war in a discussion of its opposite, healing. This was precisely what informed one of the two key figures in this exhibition, the German artist, Joseph Beuys. There is the familiar mythology and iconography of his cathartic and traumatic transformation from a soldier of the Third Reich to a post
war artist/shaman/teacher. As the curator, Jessica Morgan, points out in her essay for this exhibition, Beuys attempted to give back to the German people a sense of nature, the land and mythology, the very elements which had been appropriated by the satanic
propaganda of the Nazi regime. He achieved this by performing new rituals incorporating symbols and relics of his own invention (felt, fat, honey). In that sense he often riffed on some of the elements of religion or the symbolism of devolved
politics and philosophy. Felt and fat, for example, instead of bread and wine, the crucifix, or swastika.

For Beuys, arguably, his central concern was to make himself whole after his and his nation’s participation in war and Holocaust, and through the rituals, objects and performances of his work, to change others, individually, as groups, and, nation. This has been described as, "social sculpture," which evolved beyond the received idea of
"sculpture" as a physical object to "sculpture" as having a non physical, ephemeral aspect as a lecture, action or ritual.

The art of Beuys is in fact more like the artifact or relic that results from or signifies this activity. Often this took the form of multiples, several of which, rather arbitrarily, have been borrowed for this exhibition from the collection of the nearby Busch Reisinger Museum at Harvard University.

This reveals a fundamental flaw and weakness in an otherwise thoughtful and provocative, but not consistently clear, project by Morgan. The focus of the exhibition, which is clarified by her essay, is to look at the work of Beuys and his contemporary,
the Brazilian artist, Lygia Clark, (1920-1988). To examine the similarities and differences in there performance oriented work. They were born within a year and continents apart. Beuys was born in 1921 and died in 1986. Morgan points out that Beuys was formed by the experience of war while Clark lived on and off in Paris to avoid the Militarism of her native Brazil. She also touches on but does not deeply explore the gender differences. Beuys may easily be regarded as manly if not macho in some sense. She references a tentative argument for Clark as feminist by not seeking the kind of mass audience, obsessive documentation, and artifact making of Beuys. Her works were often personal and interactive with as few as a single individual.

Morgan argues that Clark was more of a facilitator, allowing others to have unique sensory experiences with her special masks and jump suits, rather than being, herself, the focus of attention.

In the art of Beuys, he was always the center of the activity that others reacted to as audience or individual student. Clark focused on guiding others to have their own experiences and insights. Beuys may be characterized as a teacher or priest where Clark may be viewed as therapist and mediator.

What is problematic in this exhibition is that while Beuys and Clark are the focus of her thesis, Beuys is familiar to the educated viewer, but Clark is only now becoming more widely known. A table with several of the masks and hoods by Clark, as well as some wall text and an accompanying video, serves as a skimpy introduction to what is emerging as a key artist of her generation.

My first exposure to Lygia Clark was provided by the documenta X of the French curator, Catherine David. In that large and problematic exhibition, which was a first on that scale to reach beyond a focus on American and European art, there was little context for the work. But I recall being intrigued by the costumes and masks and wondering about what they meant and how they were used. They popped up again in the Century City exhibition of Tate Modern a couple of years ago with a gallery focused on the remarkable developments of Rio de Janeiro in the 1970s. More of this work was featured in the sprawling Brazil show at the Guggenheim. Subsequently, the work of Clark and her peers have been more and more incorporated into the fabric of contemporary art exhibitions.

One of the unique pleasures of this exhibition was the inclusion of a 37-minute video of the legendary, 1974, Beuys piece, Coyote: I Like New York and New York Likes Me. It is familiar to any student of contemporary art history through a series of still photographs of the three day event in which the artist cohabited with a coyote in a
caged off area of the Rene Block Gallery in New York. There is a mythology of that piece that this video both confirms and debunks.

For one thing, that ferocious wild beast, the coyote, is skittish and scrappy, but rather like a small and untamed German shepherd. The animal did indeed tear off parts of the felt blanket that the artist wrapped himself in, but Beuys never seemed to be threatened, or in any real danger.  

The video actually helped me to understand the hanging piece of mutilated felt, an artifact of the performance, in the collection of the Beauborg. Here we see Beuys arriving swaddled and incognito by ambulance from Kennedy Airport to Soho. It reminds me of Goethe riding through the Alps with the shades of his carriage drawn so
as not to be influenced by those views while on his way to sublime Italy.

Inside the cage set up in the gallery, something to which Beuys apparently objected, he started by tossing food to the animal. We view them taking the measure of each other. Then Beuys introduced such elements as stacks of newspapers, which the coyote clawed at and pissed on. Beuys also played a triangle, used a flashlight, and periodically tossed the animal his gloves. In a curious ritual, Beuys wrapped himself in the felt blanket bending over with a cane sticking out. I had always assumed that the cane was used as protection but that does not appear to have been the case. Hidden
from the animal’s view by the felt robe, the coyote was provoked to attack. Pieces of the felt robe were bitten and pulled off until the animal appeared to be bored with this activity.

The artist and wild animal appear to have come to some mutual understanding, the point of the exercise, when they parted company. Beuys was then rewrapped or mummified and taken by ambulance back to the airport. So much for and about America. While only a handful of people actually witnessed this performance by now it
is legendary. It was typical of Beuys to provide such thorough documentation for a seemingly ephemeral performance.

Having established the thesis of Beuys and Clark as key to the exhibition, a point that will escape most viewers, how then does the work of the remaining artists’ flesh out this theme. Well, mixed. There is work where the connection is strong and obvious as
well as examples that are more oblique.

Much of the work, for example, is situated in the idea of artist responses to their own illness. Or the illness and epidemic that inflicts others. There are two large self portrait photographs by Hannah Wilkie as well as some of the art made from artifacts of her
treatment, such as hair loss. This is readily familiar and harrowing work. Less well know is work by Massachusetts artist, Richard Yarde, circles of hand prints and markings made in response to a debilitating illness.  

Sophisticated viewers will readily identify the thick swath of silver wrapped hard candies by Feliz Gonzalez-Torres. I knew enough to take one and pop it in my mouth to suck on without being told or invited. I also took off my shoes and walked over the
stone path, in decreasing circumference, by Cai Guo-Qiang. It was about reflexology and pressure points in the feet. But it hurt like hell and I jumped off the path before completing its distance. Oh ye of little faith. I also passed up the chance to buy a healing drink from his nearby vending machine. Most of that herbal medicine doesn’t
taste very good though its supposed to be good for you.

I opted not to sew anything from my pockets, like a dollar bill, as I was invited to, by the interactive work of David Medalla. Clearly a lot of folks did and I looked at this seemingly random selection of stitched stuff. I did sorta stick my hands into the big stuffed sculptures by Ernesto Nesto. It was ok I guess but it didn’t make me feel all warm and fuzzy inside. Morgan’s essay points out that his work is most directly connected to and influenced by Clark but I only learned that later. It was kind of nice to see a piece, The Rice Meals, by the much-touted German artist, Wolfgang Laib. There were a number of metal plates set up in a row each with rice except one with a small pile of hazelnut pollen. I had read a lot about the work but this was my first direct exposure to it.

The Bill T. Jones video wasn’t functioning so there is nothing to
say about that.

Thinking about the show later it seems that there are a lot of artists who might have been appropriate. What, for example, does Morgan think of the Vienna Actionists, particularly Hermann Nitsch, and his rituals in relation to those of Beuys and Clark who are of the same post war era. Or the work of Chen Zhen who was the subject of
an insightful ICA show earlier this season. His work focused largely on the same issues. Because they had recently explored it in depth did they opt not to include it here?

So, there is a lot to think about. Thanks Jessica.
 

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