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Referenced Texts

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Art & Objecthood by Michael Fried

The "Minimalists"

Visual Compendium

As per usual, this was an art movement without a manifesto for those within the movement to necessarily ascribe to, and more specifically, two of the main artists/authors authors, Robert Morris and Donald Judd, didn't like the term, nor even used it within in their early writings. The term was coined by some rando: Richard Wollheim in his 1965 essay "Minimal Art". Below are the biggest names within Minimalist sculpture at the time...

Sol Lewitt

Carl Andre

Tony Smith

Donald Judd

Robert Morris

It is important to identify that Fried's "Art and Objecthood" is of its time and in direct reaction to very contemporary developments within the NY artworld. Much like how Kant wrote much of his work in direct reaction and opposition to David Hume, or how Wittgenstein's On Certainty is a direct reaction to G. E. Moore's Proof of an External World...

In the opening line, Fried acknowledges these texts published in 1965:

  • "Minimal Art", by Wollheim in Arts Magazine
  • "ABC Art", by Barbara Rose in Art in America
  • "Specific Objects", by Donald Judd in Arts Yearbook
  • "Primary Structures", the 1966 exhibition curated by Kynaston McShine

Other relevant texts Fried is reacting to are:

  • "Notes on Sculpture", by Robert Morris in Art Forum
  • "Interview with Tony Smith" by Samuel Wagstaff in Art Forum

(the infamous New Jersey turnpike art experience w/o any art)

At question is how much is "Art and Objecthood" a debate between: A) two different discourses of art vs. B) an internal debate within one discourse of art?

A) Modernism (as defined by Greenberg, Fried and all within their school of thought that came before) vs. Minimalism (as written about by Morris, Judd, and Rose and all that opened-up afterwards)

OR

B) Is Minimalism really just the apex or the inevitable end-game of Modernism? Fried and Judd might be principally in the same school of thought, that is: Non-Objective Modernism, but they are arguing about the means to the end.

another way to ask it: is Minimalism the beginning of Post-Modernism within art (Fried's argument about theater) or is it simply "winning" at Modernism? Thus ending Modernism, because it's all figured out now and there's no more work to be done. ("Good job, Minimalism, thank you for your service")

Michael Fried and Clement Greenberg were of the Pro-American, Non-Objective, Abstract Art of the WWII and Post-War Era 1939-1960's

The ideals are that art is at its best when it focuses in upon itself in a self-critical and self-contained way. The height of Formalism, the artwork refers to nothing outside of itself and the viewer is going to the art to temporarily live within the realities of artwork. Heavily based on Immanuel Kant's "Critique of Aesthetic Judgement" and the sublime.

Clement Greenberg

Art vs. Non-Art

Non-Object vs. Object

Gestalt and relating parts within a composition

Origins in Russian Constructivism

Painting vs. Sculpture

Jean Tinguley - machine-like & "Arty"

Anthony Caro

Robert Morris

Both Robert Morris and Barbara Rose talk about the new work from the 60's connecting to these past artists/designers from Russian/Soviet Constructivism. The work is geometric, technocratic, and rests between sculpture, design, & architecture:

Joseph Kosuth - chair

vs.

Kenneth Noland - painter focused on shapes

Jules Olitski - painter who balances shape with non-shape: Sculpted Paintings

Frank Stella - painter of shapes who really sculpts his paintings

Anne Truitt - minimalist painter/sculptor who really cares about color, like a painter would and not like a "good" Minimalist would...

Robert Rauschenberg - Erased Drawing

Judd sees the works on left as a fallacy, or unnecessary illusion of a whole thing or complete gestalt.

If you have four parts that relate to each other, simply let them do it, vs. creating dramatic gestural connections. If you wanna make a long horizontal object, then just do that. Don't dress it up as something other than what it is...

Tom Friedman - 1000 hrs of staring . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

vs.

Naum Gabo

Vladimir Tatlin

Alexander

Rodchenko

Antoine

Pevsner

George

Vantongerloo

Anthropomorphism

Judd says it when sculptures have appendages and express gestural qualities. Dynamic movement, that implies movement of a living thing.

Davis Smith

Fried says it is when sculptures have the same physical "presence" (Tony Smith's usage) of a person. Their dimensions and confrontational presentation (by engaging the same space as the viewer, thus making the viewer confront that they are NOT a disembodied viewer [like Emerson's transcendental Transparent Eyeball]) make the viewed engage with their body and become self aware around the sculpture (like Sartre's "Hell is other people" eyes)

Ronald Bladen

Robert Grosvernor

https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/577723-i-become-a-transparent-eyeball-i-am-nothing-i-see

http://www.the-philosophy.com/sartre-hell-is-other-people

WHY IS THIS A BAD THING? Discourse, dialectics, and ideology...

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