Fluxus Scores and Instructions
The Transformative Years
“Make a salad.”
June 7 to September 21, 2008
Works from the Gilbert and Lila Silverman
Fluxus Collection, Detroit
Stændertorvet 3D
DK – 4000 Roskilde
Denmark
info [at] samtidskunst.dk
In 1962, George Maciunas declared Fluxus: “anti art, concept art, automatism, Bruitism, brutalism, Dada/ism, concretism, Lettrism, nihilism, indeterminacy—Theatre, happenings, prose, poetry, philosophy, plastic arts, music, cinema, dance.” *
Fluxus Scores and Instructions, The Transformative Years: “Make a salad.” looks at the armature of the movement to think about the function of scores – what they are, how they work, what they lead to…. Some are scores in the traditional musical sense, some are instructions for events or performance, some describe set-ups for situations or installations, and some are the work itself – that is, the concept.
We invite visitors to come into contact with material that has all too long been unknown to the public, hidden away like the secret recipes of chefs or grandmothers. Fluxus is often described in a two-dimensional way, as a movement of repetitive gestural performance – leaving the extraordinary range and conceptual framework of Fluxus, for the most part, unacknowledged.
“Make a salad.” brings viewers close to the actual scores, to read and interpret them for themselves, to take ideas away from the museum and try them out on their own, in the privacy of their homes or in public places. Most of the scores and instructions are complete original manuscripts or the earliest printed versions of the works. There are also performances of scores recorded in photographs and realizations presented in other forms, alongside scratchy audio from the 1960s and blurry films of early Fluxus performances. The exhibition will also include germinal pre-Fluxus scores by George Brecht, John Cage, Marcel Duchamp, Yves Klein, Walter de Maria, Yoko Ono, Karlheinz Stockhausen, and La Monte Young.
The exhibition will include work by: Bengt af Klintberg, Eric Andersen, Arman, Ay-O, Joseph Beuys, Michael von Biel, George Brecht, Sylvano Bussotti, John Cage Giuseppe Chiari, Henning Christiansen, Philip Corner, Robin Crozier, Walter de Maria, Willem de Ridder, Marcel Duchamp, Nye Ffarrabas, Robert Filliou, Albert M. Fine, Fluxus Collective, Hi Red Center, Geoff Hendricks, Dick Higgins, Toshi Ichiyanagi, Terry Jennings, Yves Klein, Milan Knizak, Alison Knowles, Addi Køpcke, Takehisa Kosugi, Shigeko Kubota, Györgi Ligeti, Jackson Mac Low, George Maciunas, Yoriaki Matsudaira, Pierre Mercure, Heinz-Klaus Metzger, Yoko Ono, Robin Page, Nam June Paik, Benjamin Patterson, James Riddle, Terry Riley, Tomas Schmit, Dieter Schnebel, Paul Sharits, Mieko Shiomi, Daniel Spoerri, Karlheinz Stockhausen, James Tenney, Yasunao Tone, Ben Vautier, Wolf Vostell, Robert Watts, Emmett Williams, La Monte Young, George Yuasa and Marian Zazeela.
The exhibition catalogue includes new, original texts by Eric Andersen, Anna Dezeuze, Letty Eisenhauer, Yoko Ono, and Susanne Rennert, as well essays by Marianne Bech and Jon Hendricks. La Monte Young has written a separate text, to be published in conjunction with the exhibition.
The exhibition is curated by Jon Hendricks, with Marianne Bech and Media Farzin.
“Make a salad.” is the score for Alison Knowles’ Proposition, first performed during the Festival of Misfits, ICA London, October 24, 1962.
* George Maciunas, “Fluxus Brochure Prospectus,” was distributed during the first Fluxus concert, June 9, 1962, “Kleinen Sommerfest/‘Après John Cage’,” in Wuppertal, West Germany.
Fluxus Scores and Instructions, The Transformative Years: “Make a salad.” is supported by Danish Arts Council Committee for International Visual Art, the Oticon Foundation, the Augustinus Foundation, The City of Roskilde and Manden med Cameraet.
For further information about the exhibition, please contact Trine Friis Sørensen, curatorial assistant, at trinefs@samtidskunst.dk or tel. +45 4631 6577
