Content provided in partnership with
Don Celender at OK Harris
Art in America, Sept, 2005 by Edward Leffingwell
Pioneering conceptual artist Don Celender's generous dialogue concerning art and esthetics with the world at large and its individuals and institutions follows a template he established early on in his long history with OK Harris, where he first showed in 1970. The primary focus of this memorial exhibition engages that conversation, presented in the form of grids of hundreds of photocopies, selected responses to surveys Celender sent forth between 1973 and 2003, enhanced by a reading room of material that offered the samplings in context and in full. The largest survey consists of an "Artist Preference Survey" addressed to "Artists, curators and museum directors" in 2001.
- Most Popular Articles in Arts
- Art since 1900: Modernism, Antimodernism, Postmodernism
- Free-standing cardboard sculpture
- What makes a successful business person? Business people who are tops in ...
- Take advantage of local advertising: TV, newspaper or magazines? If your ...
- Tino Sehgal at the ICA
- More »
He asked, "In your view which artist from any period has been the most sorely ignored, or neglected?" and elicited an astonishing 84 percent response from his strategically conceived constituency. Donald Sultan nominated Leon Polk Smith, while an assistant to Christo and Jeanne-Claude advised that the artists "do not answer questions regarding other artists or generalities ... because they are extremely dedicated to their own work." Bob Guccione nominated George Rouault and Susan Larsen, giving reason, named Gary Lang. Marisol didn't know any artists she admired who had been neglected, while inevitably someone, in this case Richard Anuskiewicz, nominated himself.
In 2000, famous chefs were asked whom they would like to feed in their establishments, and what they would serve. Jean-Georges Vongerichten suggested a "highly provocative and sexy" menu for Salvador Dali. In 1970, Celender fielded specifically structured proposals to mass-media figures, including one not-amused executive at Harpers Bazaar, who was baffled at being asked to assemble 10 years worth of models and dress them in the colors of the U.S. flag. In another survey asking celebrities what famous paintings they might choose to enter, Loni Anderson in 1998 chose Peter Paul Rubens's The Garden of Love. In 1992 Judith Malina recalled an esthetic experience dear to her heart, the student riots in the streets of Paris in the heady year of 1968.
The gallery also gathered together a number of memorable Celender works in series, including art world animal crackers and the snow-globe paperweights of his "Art Domes" (1993 and 1994), assembled with miniaturized objects including Barnet Newman's Broken Obelisk and Marcel Duchamp's Fountain. The "Holy Holy Art Cards" (1975) and "Artball Playing Cards" (1974 and 1975) combine the faces of Celender's subjects and the familiar notion of collectible cards. Lucas Samaras appears as Christ, accompanied by an appropriate text from cited publications. Football trading cards feature John Chamberlain and Henry Geldzahler as tight ends and Dali as a wide receiver. In a series of altered postcards, Vermeer's well-known depiction of the artist at his easel includes works by Whistler, Warhol, Rembrandt, Pollock, Lichtenstein, Kline and de Kooning. Irreverent and curious, Celender took the pulse of the American "artbeat." [The summer exhibition reopens Sept. 6-10.]
COPYRIGHT 2005 Brant Publications, Inc.
COPYRIGHT 2005 Gale Group
