Primary Sources: Searching for the Heart of Modern Art

PRIMARY SOURCES: SEARCHING FOR THE HEART OF MODERN ART by Jonathan Morgan 09 June 2016 Institute for Doctoral Studies in the Visual Arts [email protected] Word Count: 2,519 This paper argues that time—not autonomy, freedom, or some other related concept—is the conceptual and phenomenological thread running through Minimalism, Conceptual Art, Earth Art, and most of twentieth century Modernism. At the heart of this argument is a view of time as a process rather than a static or eternal concept. When one considers time as a flow of process within which other processes occur, Modernist purity falls away and reveals a tacit phenomenological coherence between many, if not all, Modernist art movements. The role of the viewer is considered equally alongside that of the artist and the two enter into a dialogical relationship with each other and the artwork itself. This relationship happens within time and tacitly deals with it as its phenomenological focus. Instead of formal purity or art as an a priori constant, we see here a view of art as foundationally tied into life is a complicated, messy, and fundamental way. By entertaining a common primary source of nearly all art made by human beings, we might be able to let go of artistic prejudices and feuds more easily and instead focus on what matters - simply making art in all of its varied and wondrous forms. Morgan 1 What is art? What is its purpose? What is it all about? While questions about what art is may seem simple, obvious, or even downright trivial, I propose that upon serious reflection it becomes one with an eerily tacit answer. We may ‘feel’ like we know what art is - arguments about what is art versus pornography often hinge on this kind of intuitive distinction - but a truly comprehensive answer is difficult to find. Regardless of the oddly silent nature of this answer, it would appear that seeking it out in the visual arts and the written word is a frequent obsession of Western culture. Today, I would like to take you on a short journey exploring this topic through Donald Judd’s early ruminations on the pioneering style of Minimalism, Michael Fried’s passionate response to Judd extolling the purity of Modernism in contrast, Sol Lewitt and Joseph Kosuth's’ refreshingly direct and detailed descriptions of Conceptual Art, and Robert Smithson’s explanation of his work in the genre of ‘Earth Art.’ With so many voices to hear, what could possibly be posed as a guiding point of intrigue for our trek into the realm of the nature of art? Perhaps we could ask: What could bind these thinkers in their seemingly opposing ideologies? Is there anything that might serve as a truly universal element or focus of modern art? I will argue that Smithson’s inclusion of time as an almost sculptural element of his practice opens it up as the single strongest element binding his work, Modernism, and Minimalism in a positive dialogical relationship. Time will thus be considered both scientifically and intellectually. For the purposes of this discussion, we must endeavour to understand time under the rubric of process. LeWitt’s separation of conception from the act of realization in making art highlights how there are processes that occur and inform the final artwork. Fried’s oversight is the total disregard for these temporal systems that are integral to the end product he focuses on in seeking Modernist purity in the work. Morgan 2 Judd’s focus on the experience of the work of art may be theatrical, as Fried suggests, but it is actually quite pure in its pursuit of experience as the true work of art. Judd’s description of “the new three-dimensional work” would come to be known as Minimalism (Judd 824). Fried summarizes Tony Smith’s experience on the New Jersey Turnpike as one of the seminal moments in the revelation of Minimalism (Figure 1). Fig. 1 The idea is that the experience of driving at night down the street with the road disappearing in front of you and the lights streaming by - the visceral and intellectual experience that happens in almost perfect union of what would be called the apollonian and the dionysian - cannot be captured within traditional works of art but seems superior to it in comparison. “It happens, as it merely is” (Fried 841). Fried says this not only in response to this sort of experience we can have, but even what he calls the ‘literalist’ art, or minimalism, as a whole. This ‘new style’ is distinct from both painting and sculpture in that it is less about the object than the interaction as previously discussed. In a way, there is a hint of Modernist purity in Minimalist theory when Judd describes the desire to negate the inherent topography of the Morgan 3 surface of a painted canvas. The very system of painting and arranging shapes on a canvas creates the illusion of objects arranged around each other due to the phenomenological aspects of any comprehendible composition of line, shape, and color (Judd 827). When looking at works like Malevich’s Suprematist Composition, (Figure 2) one could argue that it is a good example of Modernism and that pursuit for pure form, something that has no relation to everyday life. Fig. 2 Suprematist Composition, 1916, by Kazimir Malevich However, we cannot help as human beings to see this work and interpret the blue square at the center as in front of everything else, the black lines as being behind other shapes. Therefore, forming some sort of a three-dimensional spatial relationship that is not actually there. In this way, the piece has a more illusionist quality than anything purely intellectual. Morgan 4 This illusionism that many Modernist painters labor against is negated by Minimalism by actually working within the three-dimensional space that one’s mind forces upon the two-dimensional canvas. It is not about the objects you see, but the entire almost singular experience of the work as present before you. When walking up to one of Judd’s works (Figure 3), it is not that you are just observing the work itself. It is the entire event of feeling the work in front of you and how that feeds back onto the viewer. When considering installations like what he has done in Marfa, Texas, (Figure 4) it is the most blatant example of how we are meant to move throughout these objects and that they are not the entire artwork. It is the whole event, that experience. What is interesting is the implications that this brings through the idea of experience as we understand it in conjunction with time since one cannot help but have an experience with a beginning and an end. It implies a temporal nature to the work whether we choose to acknowledge it, or not. Fig. 3 Untitled, 1989, by Donald Judd | Fig. 4 Detail of Marfa, TX, Installation, c. 1979, by Donald Judd Morgan 5 Fried frames this interactivity within Minimalist artwork as its single greatest flaw due to its connection to theater (Fried 840). Theater is seen as the bane of Modernist ideology as it intentionally blends together multiple styles, media, and disciplines of art into a single work. The temporal nature of theater and the focus of Minimalism on a seemingly endless experience are key. The blending of costumes, lighting, painted scenery, music - all of these elements represent the impure and hybrid nature that Modernist art is in opposition to through much of art history. However, even though there is that focus on experience that ties theater to Minimalism, they are still connected through the broader element that goes beyond the multiple disciplines within theater. The experience is taking place within time and the pursuit of that experiential mode could be argued could be argued as Minimalism’s desire for a pure form similar to Modernism. A modernist painting is meant to exist as an almost timeless object expressing some part of the ideology of ‘pure form.’ When looking at Modernist works by Piet Mondrian (Figure 5), they are meant to have no connection to one’s life and therefore no connection to experience. Fig. 5 Tableau I, 1921, by Piet Mondrian Morgan 6 However, it is still experienced by the viewer when they see, think, and write about it and this takes place within time. LeWitt & Kosuth both deal with Conceptual Art and this provides us with an unexpected bridge between both Modernism and Minimalism, as has been hinted at up to his point. Conceptual art, as seen by these two, is an explicitly logical style (Kosuth 857). It praises the idea of the artwork over all else and reduces the object to the role of an anchor for that idea to the real world. Joseph Kosuth’s One and Three Chairs (Figure 6) is an elegant example of Conceptual Art with the real object, the simulation of it in the form of a photograph, and the written description displayed together. Fig. 6 One and Three Chairs, 1965, by Joseph Kosuth Morgan 7 These combined elements show how it is the idea of the chair that ties them all together with the objects merely acting as these anchors for our comprehension of the concept. LeWitt states that even the process of conceiving and making piece is applicable as art, as mentioned earlier (LeWitt 847). Kosuth’s piece could include the entirety of his written notes regarding the piece and this would be seen as inseparable from the artwork at hand. Kosuth goes one step further in rejecting the idea of aesthetics in this new style of art. This is not to say that Conceptual Art cannot look good, but it still should not be the focus because the aesthetic of it happen after the idea or concept that is the work. He even asserts that most Modernist artists through the time of his essay have had to exert minimal effort to accomplish their works, further casting aesthetics as expendable and opening up room for concepts to reign supreme (Kosuth 853). However, this bridge we have come upon remains incomplete. It is Smithson’s works of ‘earth art’ that introduce the final piece of this structure: time. When viewing works like Broken Circle (Figure 7), one can start to see how time might enter into it, but it is the way Smithson describes his use of time in his works that ties it in as more than just the reality of the piece, and is something being addressed directly in the creation of the work. Morgan 8 Fig. 7 Broken Circle, 1971, by Robert Smithson Connections forged between the behavior of the mind and the geological progression of the Earth feature heavily in Smithson’s writing. “One’s mind and the earth are in a constant state of erosion, mental rivers wear away abstract blanks, brain waves undermine cliffs of thought, ideas decompose into stones of unknowing, and conceptual crystallizations break apart into deposits of gritty reason” (Smithson 877). The metaphor formed here between the process of time that takes place on the geological scale and how the same process takes place in one’s mind is really allows for us to consider these works as Conceptual Art as well as something outside of the definition laid out by LeWitt and Kosuth. Judd embraces this and actively conceptualizes his work with its eventual erosion in mind. He even praises rust and decay in his writing as something not to be avoided but to be embraced in the creation of the work (879). This goes beyond the idea of ‘building for the future’ Morgan 9 in that the erosion of the work is considered part of it similar to the way that experience is part of a Minimalist work. This is where everything comes together. With the passage of time considered in the work through Conceptualism, we see how Smithson’s work would create a similar dynamic between the viewer and the work that Judd seeks in his pieces. The same conceptual consideration allows the very idea of time to be seen as part of the piece’s design. The whole thing can be reduced down to an effort to make the viewer “conscious of geological time” as Smithson writes (880). I argue that this meets the Modernist standard of purity as time is an eternal and even atemporal concept as it cannot really exist within itself. One could even go so far as to claim that the ‘pure forms’ sought in works like Mondrian’s are really aimed at elucidating time in all of its majesty and purity with no concept or style able to precede it. If we go along the lines of the pure form with all of the Platonic implications that would carry, it is very easy to argue for time as the purest form that everything else comes out of. This paper is admittedly wide reaching. To address the notion of time itself within seemingly contradictory styles of art may seem grand, but there are noteworthy elements that must be set aside. A comparative analysis of the aesthetics of these styles has been intentionally overlooked because the thinkers themselves have already done so, and thoroughly. This is also the result of the embracing of the Conceptualist view of the ideas behind a work being integral to the work itself. Time is seen as quietly connecting each of them in spite of any aesthetic contradictions. Morgan 10 The obvious way to attack this argument is through the physical works produced in Modernism and Minimalism. When comparing works by Judd with those of Mondrian, one could argue that Mondrian’s work is attempting to uncover an almost noumenal form via non-representation. Judd’s work, on the other hand, is based on experiential information that could be seen as anything but noumenal. However, the nature of Kosuth and LeWitt’s definitions of Conceptual Art open up a nearly unlimited range of possibilities. If the concept behind the work is the true artform, then the objects made by both Mondrian and Judd can be viewed through the same lense. When considered as Conceptual Art, the objects, their differences, and even the opposing ideologies of the artists become trivial. It is still possible to dismiss the entire notion of Conceptual Art upon which this argument rests. This is a strikingly efficient way to preserve each style’s assumed areas of control by simply reframing the discussion. However, it is equally valid to entertain Conceptual Art as valid in that every work of art has an underlying concept driving its creation. To disregard this is equivalent to denying the notion of thoughts preceding language, which is simply illogical. One could still say that Smithson’s inclusion of time appears in stark opposition to the Modernist ideology of Fried where the work is intended to be timeless, thus removing time from the work itself. Even if an artwork attempts to become timeless or represent something of that sort, it is seen, made, and interpreted within the flow of time. It is arguably inescapable as humanity is explicitly temporal in nature. Even our thoughts are time-based with one following another and building up into arguments, ideologies, and more. Smithson’s acknowledgement of this in his work reveals how every work intentionally or tangentially deals with time. The Modernist rebellion against time attempts to remove it, which is still working with the concept of Morgan 11 time as essential to the definition of it. The Minimalist focus on interactions as art creates an experience that must be understood within the flow of time, even if it is meant to be infinite. Viewers will have a beginning and end to their experience and the work’s manipulation of this through a sort of atemporal hyperreality turns time into an integral piece of the artwork. Smithson’s use of time in his work meets both the requirements of Minimalist and Modernist art as laid out by Judd and Fried, respectively, via the validity of conceptualization as intrinsic and even primary to any artwork as laid out by Kosuth and LeWitt. Beyond mere curiosity, this sort of deep analysis of these seemingly conflicting styles of art reveals how trivial such quarrels can become. I do not mean to reduce the validity and importance of Judd or Fried’s stances on this matter, but the grand scale of time as seen through Smithson opens up a new perspective of not the conflict itself, but the artworks at its core. By entertaining a common primary source of nearly all art made by human beings, we might be able to let go of artistic prejudices and feuds more easily and instead focus on what matters - simply making art in all of its varied and wondrous forms. Morgan 12 Works Cited Fried, Michael. “Art and Objecthood” Art in theory 1900-2000: An Anthology of Changing Ideas. Eds. Charles Harrison and Paul Wood. Malden: Blackwell Publishers, 2002. 835-846. Print. Judd, Donald. “Specific Objects” Art in theory 1900-2000: An Anthology of Changing Ideas. Eds. Charles Harrison and Paul Wood. Malden: Blackwell Publishers, 2002. 824-828. Print. Kosuth, Joseph. “Art after Philosophy” Art in theory 1900-2000: An Anthology of Changing Ideas. Eds. Charles Harrison and Paul Wood. Malden: Blackwell Publishers, 2002. 852-861. Print. Lewitt, Sol. “Paragraphs on Conceptual Art” Art in theory 1900-2000: An Anthology of Changing Ideas. Eds. Charles Harrison and Paul Wood. Malden: Blackwell Publishers, 2002. 846-849. Print. Smithson, Robert. “A Sedimentation of the Mind: Earth Projects” Art in theory 1900-2000: An Anthology of Changing Ideas. Eds. Charles Harrison and Paul Wood. Malden: Blackwell Publishers, 2002. 877-881. Print.