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Beyond objecthood : the exhibition as a critical form since 1968 / James Voorhies.

By: Voorhies, James Timothy [author.].
Material type: materialTypeLabelBookPublisher: Cambridge, Massachusetts : The MIT Press, [2017]Publisher: ©2017Description: ix, 275 pages : chiefly color illustrations ; 25 cm.Content type: text Media type: unmediated Carrier type: volumeISBN: 9780262035521 (hardback).Subject(s): Art -- Exhibitions -- Exhibitions -- History -- 20th century | Art -- Exhibitions -- History -- 21st century | Art exhibition audiencesDDC classification: 708 Summary: "In 1968, Robert Smithson reacted to Michael Fried's influential essay “Art and Objecthood” with a series of works called non-sites. While Fried described the spectator's connection with a work of art as a momentary visual engagement, Smithson's non-sites asked spectators to do something more: to take time looking, walking, seeing, reading, and thinking about the combination of objects, images, and texts installed in a gallery. In Beyond Objecthood, James Voorhies traces a genealogy of spectatorship through the rise of the exhibition as a critical form—and artistic medium. Artists like Smithson, Group Material, and Michael Asher sought to reconfigure and expand the exhibition and the museum into something more active, open, and democratic, by inviting spectators into new and unexpected encounters with works of art and institutions. This practice was sharply critical of the ingrained characteristics long associated with art institutions and conventional exhibition-making; and yet, Voorhies finds, over time the critique has been diluted by efforts of the very institutions that now gravitate to the “participatory.” Beyond Objecthood focuses on innovative figures, artworks, and institutions that pioneered the exhibition as a critical form, tracing its evolution through the activities of curator Harald Szeemann, relational art, and New Institutionalism. Voorhies examines recent artistic and curatorial work by Liam Gillick, Thomas Hirschhorn, Carsten Höller, Maria Lind, Apolonija Šušteršič, and others, at such institutions as Documenta, e-flux, Manifesta, and Office for Contemporary Art Norway, and he considers the continued potential of the exhibition as a critical form in a time when the differences between art and entertainment increasingly blur" - back cover.
Holdings
Item type Current library Call number Status Barcode
General lending MTU Crawford College of Art and Design Library Lending 708 (Browse shelf(Opens below)) Available 00215185
Total holds: 0

Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:

The rise of the exhibition as critical form and artistic medium, from Robert Smithson's antimodernist non-sites in 1968 to today's institutional gravitation toward the participatory.

In 1968, Robert Smithson reacted to Michael Fried's influential essay "Art and Objecthood" with a series of works called non-sites. While Fried described the spectator's connection with a work of art as a momentary visual engagement, Smithson's non-sites asked spectators to do something more: to take time looking, walking, seeing, reading, and thinking about the combination of objects, images, and texts installed in a gallery. In Beyond Objecthood , James Voorhies traces a genealogy of spectatorship through the rise of the exhibition as a critical form-and artistic medium. Artists like Smithson, Group Material, and Michael Asher sought to reconfigure and expand the exhibition and the museum into something more active, open, and democratic, by inviting spectators into new and unexpected encounters with works of art and institutions. This practice was sharply critical of the ingrained characteristics long associated with art institutions and conventional exhibition-making; and yet, Voorhies finds, over time the critique has been diluted by efforts of the very institutions that now gravitate to the "participatory."

Beyond Objecthood focuses on innovative figures, artworks, and institutions that pioneered the exhibition as a critical form, tracing its evolution through the activities of curator Harald Szeemann, relational art, and New Institutionalism. Voorhies examines recent artistic and curatorial work by Liam Gillick, Thomas Hirschhorn, Carsten H ller, Maria Lind, Apolonija Sustersič, and others, at such institutions as Documenta, e-flux, Manifesta, and Office for Contemporary Art Norway, and he considers the continued potential of the exhibition as a critical form in a time when the differences between art and entertainment increasingly blur.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

"In 1968, Robert Smithson reacted to Michael Fried's influential essay “Art and Objecthood” with a series of works called non-sites. While Fried described the spectator's connection with a work of art as a momentary visual engagement, Smithson's non-sites asked spectators to do something more: to take time looking, walking, seeing, reading, and thinking about the combination of objects, images, and texts installed in a gallery. In Beyond Objecthood, James Voorhies traces a genealogy of spectatorship through the rise of the exhibition as a critical form—and artistic medium. Artists like Smithson, Group Material, and Michael Asher sought to reconfigure and expand the exhibition and the museum into something more active, open, and democratic, by inviting spectators into new and unexpected encounters with works of art and institutions. This practice was sharply critical of the ingrained characteristics long associated with art institutions and conventional exhibition-making; and yet, Voorhies finds, over time the critique has been diluted by efforts of the very institutions that now gravitate to the “participatory.”

Beyond Objecthood focuses on innovative figures, artworks, and institutions that pioneered the exhibition as a critical form, tracing its evolution through the activities of curator Harald Szeemann, relational art, and New Institutionalism. Voorhies examines recent artistic and curatorial work by Liam Gillick, Thomas Hirschhorn, Carsten Höller, Maria Lind, Apolonija Šušteršič, and others, at such institutions as Documenta, e-flux, Manifesta, and Office for Contemporary Art Norway, and he considers the continued potential of the exhibition as a critical form in a time when the differences between art and entertainment increasingly blur" - back cover.

MTU Cork Module ARTS9005 - Recommended reading.

Table of contents provided by Syndetics

  • Acknowledgments (p. vii)
  • Introduction: "Warning" (p. 1)
  • Beyond Objecthood (p. 10)
  • The Exhibition as a Critical Form since 1968 (p. 16)
  • Chapter 1 The Rise of the Exhibition as a Form (p. 21)
  • Staging Grounds (p. 21)
  • Robert Smithson: The Time to See Non-Sites (p. 23)
  • Against a "Manneristic Modernism" (p. 24)
  • The Non-Site as Exhibition (p. 29)
  • Michael Asher: The Gallery as an Experiential Environment (p. 32)
  • Other Frames for the Viewer (p. 39)
  • At Münster: Moving toward the Perimeters (p. 42)
  • Group Material: Reshaping Forms (p. 50)
  • Grabbing Hold of the Technique (p. 55)
  • The Exhibition as a Work (p. 57)
  • Inhabiting the Institution: Modes of the Dialectic (p. 62)
  • Chapter 2 On New Institutionalism (p. 71)
  • The Critical Work (p. 71)
  • The Curator in Charge: This Is Harald Szeemann's Documenta (p. 75)
  • The Venice Biennale: Yesterday and Today (p. 92)
  • The 24/7 Biennial: Context Is Everything (p. 97)
  • Relational Art: Values of Encounters (p. 100)
  • "Learning to inhabit the world in a better way" (p. 101)
  • Manifesta: Anti-Biennial as New Institution (p. 104)
  • Manifesta 2: The Nonthematic, Thematic Exhibition (p. 107)
  • The Lifestyle Package (p. 113)
  • Kunstverein München: Invisible Orbits with Visible Change (p. 128)
  • The Future Is Now (p. 134)
  • Chapter 3 The Efficacy of a Critical Art (p. 139)
  • The Critical According to Jacques Rancière (p. 139)
  • Now Is Our Time: Martha Rosier, Josephine Meckseper, and Levi's (p. 143)
  • Thomas Hirschhorn: A Guilty Pleasure (p. 162)
  • Presence and Production: The Bijlmer Spinoza-Festival (p. 166)
  • The Crystallization of a Micro-Society (p. 172)
  • One Immersive World (p. 177)
  • Harnessing the Means of the Exhibition (p. 183)
  • Anton Vidokle: They don't have to be done like that (p. 185)
  • Michel Foucault: The Critical Attitude (p. 190)
  • Assuming the Shape of the Work (p. 193)
  • Chapter 4 The Industrial Art Complex (p. 197)
  • The Educational Turn in the Exhibition (p. 197)
  • Unexpected Byproducts of a Failed Manifesta (p. 198)
  • An Exhibition-as-School Grows in the Former East Berlin (p. 200)
  • A Mode of Address in the Curatorial Technique (p. 207)
  • New Institutionalism and Its Critics (p. 209)
  • An "Office" for Contemporary Art in Norway (p. 212)
  • Thinking Things Otherwise (p. 213)
  • An Expansion of the Public Sphere (p. 216)
  • What Ever Happened to New Institutionalism? (p. 222)
  • Carsten Höller: Down a Slide (p. 224)
  • Conclusion: On the Road (p. 231)
  • Notes (p. 235)
  • Index (p. 265)

Reviews provided by Syndetics

CHOICE Review

Beyond Objecthood traces a genealogy of spectatorship and notions of participatory practice of contemporary artists and curators by examining those agents as well as the works of art and institutions that have given rise to the exhibition as a critical form. Four chapters bracketed by an introduction and a conclusion consider the spatial, temporal, and experiential activities that comprise art exhibitions and the framing of the visitor experience as incursions that bear witness to instances of momentary visual engagement (as conceived by Michael Fried) or, on the other hand, durational exercise (as conceived by Robert Smithson's staging of experiences vis-à-vis his "non-sites"). Voorhies (California College of the Arts) pays close attention to those who disseminate a discourse about artistic and visitor practices--from artists and curators to scholars, critics, and institutions--while questioning the possibilities and futures for art, institutions, and exhibitions. Including more than 70 color illustrations and a handful of black-and-white figures, this volume will be valuable for those interested in contemporary art's intersections with museums, galleries, and modes of display and engagement and those seeking context for curatorial endeavors, artistic practice, and history and theory of exhibitions. Summing Up: Recommended. Lower-division undergraduates through faculty and professionals. --Juilee Decker, Rochester Institute of Technology

Author notes provided by Syndetics

James Voorhies is a curator and art historian of modern and contemporary art. He is Dean of Fine Arts and Associate Professor at California College of the Arts in San Francisco.