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The Whitney Museum is organising a large retrospective exhibition on Gordon Matta-Clark which will be on view from 22 feb 2007 till 7 jun 2007.
"During the brief but highly productive ten years that he worked as an artist, and even more so since his death, Gordon Matta-Clark (1943-1978) has exerted a powerful influence on artists and architects who know his work. This retrospective will bring together the breadth of his practice to reveal the unique beauty and radical nature of his punnings, plans, performances, and interventions evident in the many media in which he worked: the sculptural objects (most notably from building cuts), drawings, fims, photographs, notebooks, and documentary material."
As of 5 jul 2006, DDV has been writing to Christina Kukielski, Senior Curatorial Assistant at the Whitney Museum, about his tribute piece "Diggin' for Gordon".
hello,
this is ddv speaking. i have heard about the whitney museum organizing a full-scale retrospective of the work of gordon matta-clark.
i am currently making a piece which is kinda dedicated to him called "diggin' for gordon". for 5 months now, i'm digging a hole at a secret location that nobody knows about. the digging process however can be followed by a webcam, which shows images day and night on my website. on rare occasions you can watch me digging.
apart from the image from the webcam, i also installed a kind of blog, where i'm writing about the project and where people can leave comments.
the matta-clark 'tribute' is also 'mashed up' with some other artists' work like dan flavin (he takes care of the light) and james lee byars (he provides a dumping ground for the earth from the hole).
on 16 march 2006 i also did a performance where i left behind several bags of earth from the hole at art galleries who had an opening night. the earth was packed in aldi warehouse bags. aldi is a cheap supermarket that once in a while also sells art.
i would appreciate if you could pay some attention to my "diggin' for gordon" in your show since i presume it's a unique opportunity to have my 'tribute' going on right now. i have no idea at this point where the digging will lead to, it just continues....
all the best,
ddv
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on 17 jul 2006 he got this reply:
Dear DDV,
Thanks for your email. Do you have the link to the webcam images of your project?
Best of luck,
Tina Kukielski
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upon which he replied the same day:
hello tina,
i am currently in berlin, and will stay here for about three weeks. so there will be no digging for the time being.
there is of course a page that has a lot of images from the project from the start till present, it is here:
http://www.clubmoral.com/ddv/digginforgordon/gordonarchive.html
there is also a belgian art critic, who wrote a text for a belgian art-magazine <h>art. an extended version of this text (where my work is described in conjunction to the work of jan fabre) will also appear in an annual book published by the museum of contemporary art muhka in antwerp. if you like i can check if they have a translation in english.
a log with comments of visitors to the website is here:
http://www.clubmoral.com/ddv/digginforgordon/gordontalk.html
this page also has quite some explanation about the project.
all the best,
ddv
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on 20 jul 2006 he sent the mentioned text:
hello tina,
find enclosed the text about diggin' for gordon by gerrit vermeiren. the text will be published in 'contemporary art in belgium' due in november 2006.
all the best,
ddv
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upon no reply he enquired again on 1 aug 2006:
dear tina,
did you have the chance to read the text i sent you?
as of next thursday the diggin' continues.
ddv
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on 5 sep 2006 he again reported about "Diggin' for Gordon":
tina,
two movies have been added to the 'diggin' for gordon' website:
http://www.clubmoral.com/ddv/digginforgordon/videoviewer.html
ddv
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on 5 nov 2006 he sent another mail, to Tina Kukielski as well as to her assistant Jessica Witkin:
to all who are interested.
a couple of months ago i sent you some information about my "diggin' for gordon" project. since you're doing an exhibition about gordon matta-clark next year i think this project is worth being mentioned and/or included.
in the meantime the webpages have moved to the "bastard art gallery", where the project resides next to other related art.
the text i mailed you will be in a book about art in belgium, to appear this month. a full page ad was featured in issue 10 of the belgian art magazine <h>art.
next saturday a large group show opens in antwerps' "extra city" artspace. one artist will build a large sand sculpture with about 2000kgs of sand hauled up from the hole recently.
there are also a couple of new videos available on the website.
ddv
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All this time, there was no reply anymore from the Whitney Museum. - That's not fair.
Too bad there's no interest for the crazy ones, the misfits, the rebels, the troublemakers, the round pegs in the square holes. Because they're not fond of rules, and have no respect for the status quo, they are ignored. You can praise them, disagree with them, quote them, disbelieve them, glorify or vilify them.
About the only thing that you can't do is ignore them.
Therefore we at the Bastard Art Gallery, Think Different:
- We think that artists who manage to present their work and create their own platform and their own modes of communication deserve some serious attention once in a while.
- We think that DDV's tribute to Gordon Matta-Clark deserves to be integrated in a retrospective which states that Matta-Clark "has exerted a powerful influence on artists and architects who know his work".
- We think that putting one computer monitor with a network connection in the exhibition is not too much a big deal for the Whitney to handle.
- We think that the opening on or about 22 feb 2007 would be just fine to celebrate exactly one year of DDV's digging.
If you think the same, you should sign the petition right here, right now!
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