Without Beginning or End
Marinus Boezem
Without Beginning or End
He is one of the pioneers of conceptual art in the Netherlands, together with Stanley Brouwn, Jan Dibbets and Ger van Elk. Marinus Boezem, who participated in Op losse schroeven (1969) and Sonsbeek buiten de perken (1971), the Arte Povera representative in the Netherlands, a man of verticals and horizontals and the weather in between – how does he look back on his best-known works?
I see an interesting parallel between your work and the Italian word ‘tempo’, which has three meanings: time, weather and the tempo in music. The relationships between these three elements are central to your work, a consistent thread that exposes certain dynamics. I would also like to emphasize that in the 50 years that you have been active, your work has always remained current, is always in motion, just like the weather. What fascinates me is your autonomous position in regards to time and your quest to find an ideal time which is consistent, despite the caprices of history.
‘That has to do with my interest in such composers as Morton Feldman, Giacinto Scelsi, John Cage and Philip Glass, who are very close to me. What touches me is the lack of a beginning or an ending in their work, the passing by and disappearing that also returns in the connections I make between art and the weather. What interests me about the weather is its uncontrollability, the aspect of total independence. I think it is beautiful that it can be recorded by scientific methods, that it can be registered with symbols, in the same way that musical scores indicate the tempos. Like the landscapes painted in the 17th and 18th centuries, a representation can also be made of the weather, providing a moment in time with curved lines, stripes, letters and descriptions: symbols of events that give important information for people in our society. The relationship between people and the weather has always intrigued me. From there, it is a small step to the relationship between music and art. They both have a history that has to be brought up to date, again and again, like Gothic art that tries to reach the highest point and thus the immaterial, referring to all conceivable forms of transcendence. Something like that does not simply allow itself to be connected to current events, but reveals its own dynamic in time.’
For you, architecture also has a dynamic of its own. It seems like a contradiction in terms, but the motion in architecture is apparently the connecting factor between history and spirituality. Your project A volo d’uccello (In Bird-flight), presented in 2010 at De Vleeshal in Middelburg, includes an architectural element, a drawing of the floor plan of the St. Francis Cathedral in Assisi, made out of birdseed, which in the course of time was eaten by doves. For me, as curator of the exhibition, it was the first time that a project was recorded with a web camera, which registered the slow disappearance of the floor plan and made it possible to experience it in time, for everybody everywhere, via the Internet. The Gothic architecture of De Vleeshal was a beautiful context for the project.
‘For A volo d’uccello, I brought two elements together: an architectural element and the birds, so that a dialogue was created, based on motion and change. What I was trying to achieve was a perspective from above, in other words from the flight of a bird. You could see one floor plan of the basilica in the exhibition space, while there was another one on the flat roof of my studio, and it was continuously filmed by a permanently installed security camera. Lightness, movement and context are central elements, all of which appear in the series of works entitled Wind Tables and Soft Tables, sculptures I made at the end of the 1960s. In them, I tried to bring form and context into balance: fifty percent was the result of their surrounding environment, while the other fifty percent was comprised of an ordinary table with a fan that caused motion throughout the whole. That created a continually changing dynamic, as there is in music, or more pointedly: a cinematographic effect. That is to say that the one is not more important than the other. There is no hierarchy. I find that very interesting in art – the fact that nothing is above something else. That is why “art with muscle” has never interested me very much. Art can just as well be invisible, or not even perceived as art.’
These ideas are also visibly present in a number of legendary exhibitions from the 1960s, which were by the way very controversial at the time, such as the related exhibitions Op losse schroeven (1969) at the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam and When Attitudes Become Form (1969) at the Kunsthalle in Bern. Of those two exhibitions, the one in Amsterdam was probably the most daring, because it took place in a museum with a permanent collection. Amongst other things, you hung sheets out of the windows of the museum. The pompous façade of the museum was brought into discussion by the flapping sheets hanging out of all the windows. At the same time, that work unmistakably opened the doors to art that was focused on public space, on the streets, and that in a dialogue with the city literally and figuratively moved out of the museum with its static architecture, in order to create movement.
‘You are referring to the façade of the Stedelijk Museum; that became a world-famous trademark. I was looking for a way, at once both radical and mundane, to renew the visual language of the museum and offer it a new dynamic, an image that would stick with you, referring on the one hand to the tradition of hanging bedclothes out of the windows for hygienic reasons, and on the other hand, focusing the eye to the outside.’
This work is in part important because the people of Amsterdam practically saw the Stedelijk Museum as their second home. The idea of making the museum a place that stood close to the people was also in the philosophies of the artists.
‘Both the political left and the political right watched the anti-hierarchical Stedelijk with interest. At that time, what was going to happen with the museum was an important subject of debate. The Op losse schroeven exhibition brought Arte Povera, conceptual art and minimal art together. Experiments took place, attempts to expand the definition of a museum as a ‘white cube’. It was in that context that it was possible for Kounellis’ works with coal to come about. That was also what people were striving for: expanding the context in order to extend the limitations of art. That is in part what helps determine the success of art in public space: a dialogue with streets and city squares, with the energy of the landscape. It was an important step. The protection offered by galleries and museums must not be underestimated. Duchamp repeatedly demonstrated that art is gradually shifting towards real life. For me, that is a revolutionary direction which art must always be taking.’
What I find so exceptional about that period, compared with today, is that you succeeded in convincing the museum to present projects that turned the museum itself on its head. It was turned upside down both on the outside and on the inside, by works of art that exposed its very foundations and made it look foolish. That process was a major step for contemporary art, which was exploring possibilities for a new visual language for exhibitions in a perpetual dialogue between materials, performances and context. On the other hand, it disrupted the position of the museum, which the title, Op losse schroeven (literally, ‘on loose screws’), already implied. How difficult was it to actually convince Wim Beeren, curator of the exhibition, and Edy de Wilde, director of the museum? That could not have been simple.
‘You had to involve them at an intellectual level. First and foremost, the artists – Jan Dibbets, Ger van Elk, myself and a few others – had a discussion with Beeren about content. It was only after that that he was confronted with the material consequences. By that time, he could not turn back, but what was so good about Beeren was that he did not want to let go of the project and defended it, so he was able to convince Edy to let the show go ahead.’
It was therefore fundamental to have had a theoretical dialogue beforehand.
‘That was an important idea that was catching on at the time. We not only spoke with Beeren, but also with the Van Abbemuseum, because we wanted to convince Jean Leering of our ideas. He thought it was a fantastic project, but he did not carry it out, despite previous solo exhibitions by Bruce Nauman and William Wiley and an exhibition about the development of minimal art. For our exhibition, the Van Abbemuseum was actually better suited, because it was in principle even more anti-hierarchical. Leering moreover wanted to have real intellectual exchange with the artists. In the years after that, he did exhibitions with artists who had participated in Op losse schroeven, including Panamarenko and myself, and Dibbets.’
In 1975, you began a fantastic project at the Dam Square in Middelburg, entitled Podio del Mondo per l’Arte. It was a combination of art, museum and the public: art in public space as a work in progress. You invited artists, architects and musicians to place works on the floor of the Grain Exchange, which had been there for centuries. There, you are now the director of a museum with 25 works by artists ranging from Lawrence Weiner to Francesco Arena, which we opened together two years ago.
‘The Grain Exchange was standing empty. The building was not being used and I found it an interesting idea to turn an edifice that looks like a temple and reminds us of Italy – which explains the Italian title – into a magical place, in which everything in art could change and on which everyone could project their ideas. Even if it had remained empty, it would continue to function perfectly well. Then it became a Gesamtkunstwerk. For my entire life as an artist, I have worked together with colleagues. The first person whose collaboration I proposed was Herman de Vries. I asked him to do something on the middle of the stage. The building’s function imposed limitations on the artists. De Vries’s contribution was a stone with the inscription ‘Here and Anywhere’, and from that moment on, that place could be anywhere. The idea behind it is that you can make art anywhere. I also had to think of Walter De Maria, the maker of such an incredible work as The Lightning Field, which only a few people have ever seen out in the desert, but which has earned itself a place in our collective memory. The idea is that of an ideal place where everything becomes art.’
In this project, the relationship with the viewers is in the forefront. They can walk right across works by Terry Fox, Aldo van Eyck, Braco Dimitrijevi? and others, while the works meanwhile fill up the space of the museum. Looking at it this way, we can speak of a horizontal museum.
‘As I said, half of my work comes from the art itself and half of it from the context, including the visitors. These two elements are equally important. It was also at this location that I got the idea for The Porsche Academy. In the late 1970s, I wanted to set up an art school, not an institute with a building and overhead, but made up of seven Porsches that were coordinated from here and seven important artists who would be appointed professors. The student could call on a professor, whose presence would be guaranteed within 24 hours of being called on. Once a month, there would be an evaluation at the Podio del Mondo per l’Arte. The Arts Council, where I had applied for subsidy, thought it was a brilliant idea, but asked if the project could also be done with Citroën 2CVs. The decision to use Porsches was inspired by the fact that the Dutch national police at the time had Porsches at their disposal. That meant that a Porsche could quickly come to someone’s help whenever they needed it – in this case, the artist.’
Lorenzo Benedetti is director of De Vleeshal in MiddelburgLorenzo Benedetti is director of De Vleeshal in Middelburg
Lorenzo Benedetti