AR312 Week 22

1

• AR312 Week 22
• The Institution of Critique
• Part I - Institutional Critique by Artists in the
  1960s 70s
• Matthew Poole

2

• There was once an art which was conceived for the
  museums, and the fact that the museums look like
  mausolea may actually reveal to us the attitude
  weve had to art in the past. It was a form of
  paying respect to the dead. Now, I dont know how
  much more work there is available from the past
  that has to be displayed or respected. But if
  were going to talk about the works being
  produced in the last few years, and which are to
  be produced in the near future, then the concept
  of the museum is completely irrelevant. I should
  like to pursue the question of the environment of
  the work of art what kind of work is being done
  now where it is best displayed, apart from the
  museum, or its miniature counterpart, the
  gallery.
• From What is a Museum,
• Alan Kaprow, in conversation with Robert
  Smithson, 1970

3

• 18 Happenings in 6 Parts, Fall, 1959 (Man with
  white shirt is Allan Kaprow)

4

• It is artists as much as museums or the market
  who, in their very efforts to escape the
  institution of art, have driven its expansion.
  With each attempt to evade the limits of
  institutional determination, to embrace an
  outside, to redefine art or reintegrate it into
  everyday life, to reach everyday people and
  work in the real world, we expand our frame and
  bring more of the world into it.
• But we never escape it.
• Andrea Fraser, From the Critique of Institutions
  to an Institution of Critique, ARTFORUM, Sept.
  2005

5
Escape Attempts Conceptual Art in the 1960s 70s
6
Campbells Tomato Juice, 1964  6 boxes of
synthetic polymer paint and silkscreen on wood 
7
Brillo Boxes, c.1965, 2 boxes of synthetic
polymer paint and silkscreen on wood 
8
John Baldessari, "I will not make any more boring
art, c.1965
9
Robert Barry Art Work (1970) It is always
changing. It has order. It doesn't have a
specific place. Its boundaries are not fixed. It
affects other things. It may be accessible but go
unnoticed. Part of it may also be part of
something else. Some of it is familiar. Some of
it is strange. Knowing of it changes it.
10
Victor Burgin, "Any Moment," (1970) 0ANY
MOMENT PREVIOUS TOTHE PRESENT MOMENT1THE
PRESENT MOMENT ANDONLY THE PRESENT
MOMENT2ALL APARENTLY INDIVIDUALOBJECTS
DIRECTLY EXPERIENCEDBY YOU AT 13ALL OF YOUR
RECOLLECTION AT 1OF APPARENTLY INDIVIDUAL
OBJECTSDIRECTLY EXPERIENCED BY YOU AT0 AND
KNOWN TO BE IDENTICALWITH 24ALL CRITERIA BY
WHICH YOU MIGHT DISTINGUISH BETWEEN MEMBERS OF
3AND 2
11
5ALL OF YOUR EXTRAPOLATION FROM2 AND 3
CONCERNING THE DISPOSITIONOF 2 AT 06ALL
ASPECTS OF THE DISPOSITIONOF YOUR WON BODY AT 1
WHICH YOU CONSIDER IN WHOLE OR INPART
STRUCTURALLY ANALOGOUSWITH THE DISPOSITION OF
27ALL OF YOUR INTENTIONAL BODILYACTS
PERFORMED UPON ANY MEMBEROF 28ALL OF YOUR
BODILY SENSATIONSWHICH YOU CONSIDER
CONTINGENTUPON YOUR BODILY CONTACT WITHANY
MEMBER OF 29ALL EMOTIONS DIRECTLY
EXPERIENCEDBY YOU AT 1
12
10ALL OF YOUR BODILY SENSATIONSWHICH YOU
CONSIDER CONTINGENTUPON ANY MEMBER OF 911ALL
CRITERIA BY WHICH YOU MIGHTDISTINGUISH BETWEEN
MEMBERS OF10 AND 912ALL OF YOUR RECOLLECTION
AT 1OTHER THAN 313ALL ASPECTS OF 12 UPON
WHICHYOU CONSIDER ANY MEMBER OF 9TO BE
CONTINGENT ---------------------------------
13

• Moving from a substantive understanding of
  institution as specific places, organisations,
  and individuals to a conception of it as a social
  field, the question of whats inside and what is
  outside becomes much more complex.
• Andrea Fraser, From the Critique of Institutions
  to an Institution of Critique, ARTFORUM, Sept.
  2005

14
200 Green and White Posters, by Daniel Buren,
1968, various locations around Paris.
15
Daniel Buren "L'une des possibles, 1973.0,8 x
16 m. Installation at 26, rue Beaubourg 75003
Paris
16
Les Deux Plateaux, 19851986, work in situ, Cour
dhonneur du Palais-Royal, Paris, France
17
Les Deux Plateaux, 19851986, work in situ, Cour
dhonneur du Palais-Royal, Paris, France
18
Les Deux Plateaux, 19851986, work in situ, Cour
dhonneur du Palais-Royal, Paris, France
19
Daniel Buren, 1971 Guggenheim Museum, New York
20
Daniel Buren, 1971 Guggenheim Museum, New York
21
Color, Rhythm, Transparency, work in situ The
Single Frieze, Thannhauser 4, 200405, Eye of
The Storm By Daniel Buren Solomon R. Guggenheim
Museum, New York.
22
Michael Asher. Installation at Claire Copley
Gallery, Sept. 21 - Oct. 12, 1974.
23
Michael Asher's installation of a bronze cast of
Jean Antoine Houdon's statue of George Washington
(1788/1917) , Art Institute of Chicago 1979,
24
Asher, Michael American Exhibition (workers
removing statue) June 9-Aug. 5, 1979
25
Asher, Michael American Exhibition
(re-positioning the statue) June 9-Aug. 5, 1979
26
Asher, Michael Installation at Pomona College
(isometric drawing) Feb. 13-Mar. 8, 1970
27
Asher, Michael Installation at Pomona College
(Axonometric drawing) Feb. 13-Mar. 8, 1970
28
Asher, Michael Installation at Pomona College
(view from street) Feb. 13-Mar. 8, 1970
29
Asher, Michael Installation at Pomona College
(detail of entry) Feb. 13-Mar. 8, 1970
30
Asher, Michael Installation at Pomona College
(view from gallery) Feb. 13-Mar. 8, 1970
31
Asher, Michael Installation at Pomona College
(view from passage way) Feb. 13-Mar. 8, 1970
32
Asher, Michael Installation at Pomona College
(detail of prop construction) Feb. 13-Mar. 8,
1970
33
Michael AsherInstallation View,The Renaissance
Society, 1990, University of Chicago Gallery
34

• "Inspecting a gallery space and taking notes
  is an essential part of my method, since my
  work never consists of simply adding
  preconceived or completed objects for exhibition
  purposes. Consequently the information in my
  installations very often exposes the people,
  money, and ideas that are behind and support art
  institutions, and enrich and alter our
  understanding of their social "function" and the
  artworks they contain.
• Michael Asher, 1990

35
Marcel Broodthaers Musée d'Art Moderne Section
XVII Siècle, Anversa, 1969.
36
Marcel Broodthaers Jürgen Harten, Section XIXe
Siècle (bis), Städtische Kunsthalle, Düsseldorf,
14-15 February 1970.
37
Marcel Broodthaers, Musée d'Art Moderne,
Département des Aigles, Section des Figures
1972. Städtische Kunsthalle di Düsseldorf.
38
Marcel Broodthaers, Musée d'Art Moderne,
Département des Aigles, Section des Figures
1972. Städtische Kunsthalle di Düsseldorf.
39
Marcel Broodthaers, Musée d'Art Moderne,
Département des Aigles, Section des Figures
1972. Städtische Kunsthalle di Düsseldorf.
40
Marcel Broodthaers Musée d'Art Moderne Finance
Section, 1969.
41
Marcel Broodthaers Musée d'Art Moderne Finance
Section Catalogue, 1972.
42
Hans Haacke, "Sphere in Oblique Air-Jet", 1967.
43
Hans Haacke Condensation Cube, 1963-1965.
44
Hans Haacke, Blue Sail, 1964/1965
45
Hans Haacke, MoMa Poll, 1971
46
"Shapolsky et al. Manhattan Real Estate Holdings,
a Real-Time System, as of May 1, 1971"
47
(No Transcript)
48
(No Transcript)
49
Germania, by Hans Haake, German Pavilion, Venice
Biennale 1993
50
Cowboy with Cigarette. 1990.By Hans
Haacke Pasted paper, charcoal, ink, and frame, 37
x 31 x 2 3/8" (94 x 80 x 6 cm). Collection Joseph
Lebon. Photo courtesy John Weber Gallery, New
York Transformation of Picasso's collage Man
with a Hat (1912-13, from The Museum of Modern
Art's collection). Philip Morris was supporting
the Museum's exhibition Picasso and Braque
Pioneering Cubism.
51

• There is, of course, an outside to the
  institution, but it has no fixed, substantive
  characteristics. It is only what, at any given
  moment, does not exist as an object of artistic
  discourses and practices. But just as art cannot
  exist outside the field of art, we cannot exist
  outside the field of art, at least not as
  artists, critics, curators, etc. And what we do
  outside the field, to the extent that it remains
  outside, can have no effect within it. So if
  there is no outside for us, it is not because the
  institution is perfectly closed, or exists as an
  apparatus in a totally administered society, or
  has grown all-encompassing in size and scope. It
  is because the institution is inside of us, and
  we cant get outside ourselves.
• Andrea Fraser, From the Critique of Institutions
  to an Institution of Critique, ARTFORUM, Sept.
  2005

52
Haacke, HansAnd You Were Victorious After
All1988--Graz, Austria (destroyed)
53
1937 photograph of market square in Graz, as
decorated for Nazi celebration
54
Mariensaule (Mary Column)17th c. monument to
Hapsburg victory over the Turks
55
Billboards set up to document Nazi sympathies in
Graz
56
Photographs documenting the firebombing of
Haackes piece