Beruflich Dokumente
Kultur Dokumente
II
III
UNNAMABLE NAME
UNNAMABLE NAME
An installation within the book-stacks
at the Tompkins County Public Library
101 E. Green St., Ithaca, NY 14850
Participating artists:
Ayisha Abraham
Kenseth Armstead
Kim Asbury
Jeff de Castro
Elizabeth Cohen
David Diao
Toby Greenberg
Johan Grimonprez
Jane Jin Kaisen
Janet Koenig
Katherine Liberovskaya
Phill Niblock
Jenny Polak
Rit Premnath
Martha Rosler
Dread Scott
Greg Sholette
Buzz Spector
Jacob Tell
Mierle Laderman Ukeles
Isn’t this why the library has become an ongoing battle Sally Grubb, Beth Killheffer, Kim Asbury,
ground for surveillance vs privacy issues, especially after Megan Pugh, Valorie Rockney, Karl Fitzke,
911? Shifter Magazine and Jelena Stojanović.
Artists were asked to create work for underused non Much thanks to Chris white for the opening night
-art spaces inside the Tompkins County Library in music improvisation for Samuel Beckett’s Film, 1965.
Ithaca New York. This unnamable art appeared as
sightings, un-bindings, and unidentified objects located Chris White is cellist and composer who plays classical,
in the “gaps,” “voids,”and “empty” places between the jazz and other improvisational styles. He has two solo
categories of information and entertainment the typical CDs and has played on recordings by other artists.
library visitor is usually in search of. The artwork worked Chris is the director of the international New Directions
to address the persistence, repetition, and notion of the Cello Association and Festival, now in its 14th year.
unnamable, as sightings between identity or naming of For more information about Chris White visit:
a category. www.newdirectionscello.com/chriswhite/index.htm
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the typical library visitor is usually in search of.”
This manifestation builds on and works through the
complicated history of the avant-garde/neo-avant-garde
critical art interventions, such as the staging of art in the
factories by Italian and Russian futurists at the beginning
of the last century in Europe (avant-garde); or numerous
instances of contextual, performative artistic practices,
perhaps somewhat uneasily referred to as site-specific or
About the Library: The Fine Art of Camouflage site-oriented practices, that have developed around the
world since the 1950s (neo-avant-garde).
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Katherine Liberovskaya similarly examines the theme of shift in library categorization as a way to expose inherent
borders and fraternity while reflecting “on NAFTA and arbitrariness. Similarly, Jeff de Castro, in his installation
the European Union as symbols of political fraternity or Odd Infinitum (2007), created a series of mirrored
fellowship and the conflict between national and pan- carts placed strategically in the library, addressing the
national identity in the global economy.” ingrained self-referentiality of library systems. In the
same vein, Jane Jin Kaisen’s video work, Conceptual
Kenseth Armstead’s installation, Spook (2005), Cathedrals (2007), displayed on library computer
composed of three prints and a video located on the back monitors, exposes library institutional mechanisms.
wall behind the book shelves, explores the issues of race Dread Scott’s series of interventions - Title Sealed
and identity formation, ultimately raising the question (2007), mock book wraps interspersed on the shelves
of history writing and the uses and abuses of historical in the biography and history sections, and Removed for
knowledge. Likewise, Elizabeth Cohen’s installation your protection (2007), alterations on stack numbering,
Untitled,(2007), placed on a shelf with Latin American in a barely visible gesture - highlight the politics of
history, frames the undeniable passage of time as a way to information and the public sphere.
problematize the formation of historical temporalities.
Ayisha Abraham’s installation Land-Scapes or Reality is Abstract painter David Diao’s collage Bobst Library
Neatly Framed From Here (2007), on library computer Floor, (2008) nonetheless, frames what he perceives
monitors, in like manner critically examines the ways to be both alienating and/or mythical workings of the
knowledge is constructed and represented. modernist architectural discourse.
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Buzz Spector’s collaboration with Lisa Nichols, Shelf This is not an art exhibition, this is a library occupation
Life (1993-95), displayed in the Periodicals reading area, – library patrons beware!
is an installation which deliberately blurs the distinction
between the private and public, fact (document) and
fiction.
VII
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Gregory Sholette, Still Life with Dead Fascists (2007) Johan Grimonprez, Double Take (2007)
Two resin figurines installed with books [8”x 8”] Video [work in progress]
Cultural critics from Walter Benjamin to Roland Barthes Double Take is an adaptation of a J.L.Borges’
have argued that the most sentimental and debased forms story portraying a world of doppelgangers starring
of art often reflect contemporary society better than professional Hitchcock look-alike Ron Burrage. Now
those of the fine or “high arts”. Pulp novels, ‘B’ movies, in post-production at Anna Sanders Films (Paris)
cheap advertising all directly apprehend what less “base” it is scheduled to be released later this year. A first
modes of culture often obscure. My work involves chapter, called Looking For Alfred, premiered at the
examining and reproducing work in the “debased” form Photographer’s Gallery (London) and the Palais Des
of souvenirs, figurines, action figures, and plastic model Beaux-Arts (Brussels), and went on to win a Spirit
kits and often takes the form of scenes, or dioramas that Award (New York), as well as the 1st prize at the ZKM
I then photograph and display. I have chosen to work International Media Award in 2005.
with these familiar, ‘middle-brow’ forms because they
navigate a narrow line between irony and innocence, Johan Grimonprez achieved international acclaim
the sentimental and the uncanny. Like portable icons with his video collage, Dial H-I-S-T-O-R-Y. With its
I imagine these momentos invoking sentimental premiere at Centre Pompidou and Documenta X in
longings as well as everyday life and small-scale Kassel in 1997, it eerily foreshadowed the events of
histories. According to scholar Jeffrey Skoller, Sholette’s September 11th. The film tells the story of airplane
“counter-practices have been less concerned with the hijackings since the 1970s and how these changed the
commodification of culture and artistic auteurism than course of news reporting. The movie consists of recycled
with working in multiple ways to create an arts culture images taken from news broadcasts, Hollywood movies,
committed to critical practice, that redefines the role animated films and commercials.
of the autonomous artist into a citizen participant
actively working to transform cultural discourses and Grimonprez’s productions have traveled the main
institutions within their communities.” (From Selected festival circuit from Telluride, Los Angeles, Rio de
Works catalog essay, Colgate University) Janeiro, to Tokyo and Berlin. Curatorial projects were
hosted at major exhibitions and museums worldwide
Gregory Sholette is a New York-based sculptor, multi- such as the Whitney Museum in New York, San
media artist, writer, and founding member of the art Francisco Museum of Modern Art, Pinakothek der
collectives Political Art Documentation and Distribution Moderne, Munich and the Tate Modern in London.
and REPOhistory. Recent exhibitions include “Weather Grimonprez’s work is included in numerous collections
Report, “Boulder Museum of Contemporary Art with such as the Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris, the
Janet Koenig, “Historical Revisionism” at the Other Kanazawa Art Museum, Japan, the National Gallery,
Cinema, San Francisco, and “Mapquest” at PS122, Berlin and the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art,
NYC, and “Survive/Alive,” with J. Koenig at Wave Denmark. Nominated for the Hugo Boss Award in
Hill, Bronx. Along with Blake Stimson he co-edited the 2005.
book Collectivism After Modernism: The Art of Social
Imagination after 1945 (University of Minnesota,
2007), and together with Nato Thompson co-edited
The Interventionists: A Users Manual for the Creative Johan Grimonprez lives and works in Brussels and
Disruption of Everyday Life (MassMoCA/MIT Press, New York. In 2007 he had his first retrospective at the
2004, 2006). Sholette is an Assistant Professor of Pinakothek Der Moderne (München), accompanied by
Sculpture in the Department of Art and Art History a monograph with texts by Thomas P. Elseasser, Slavoj
at Queens College, and is currently working on a book Zizek and Tom Mccarthy.
about the political economy of the art world and his
concept of creative “dark matter” for Pluto Press, UK.
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Armstead’s multimedia and installation works have
been exhibited at the Brooklyn Museum, Whitney
Museum of American Art, Bronx Museum of Art,
Studio Museum in Harlem and MIT. Grants include
a Pollock-Krasner Award, NYFA video fellowship,
NYSCA (Individual Artist Grant, Film & Media / New
Technical Production,) and a Camille Hanks-Cosby
Fellowship.
www.kensetharmstead.com
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Please see attached final draft of ICE Escape Sign for Tompkins County Library. Please look over it and see if it corresponds with your
knowledge of the building. If there are discrepancies, please let me know as soon as possible as I plan to get it face mounted and sent
out to you in the next few days.
www.jennypolak.com
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Jane Jin Kaisen, Conceptual Cathedrals (2007) Buzz Spector and Lisa Nichols, Shelf Life (1993-95)
Short film / Video (three channel) Length: 17 minutes
In the summer of 1993, Lisa Nichols commissioned
Director, editing, script structure: Jane Jin Kaisen Buzz Spector to fill a shelf in her library with books of his
Camera: Jane Jin Kaisen / Carl Johan Sennels choice, the site to be determined by mutual agreement,
with completion of the selection to be determined by the
Script development: Dag Petersson, Jan Bäcklund, choice of site. The work includes the books on site, a
Tobias Hübinette, Deborah Caldwell-Stone photograph of the installation, and this list of titles, in
the order of their purchase and shipment.
Actors:
Dag Petersson (The Royal Archivist)
Jan Bäcklund (The Conceptual Collector) Jorge Luis Borges, Ficciones
Tobias Hübinette (The Anarchist) (translated by Emecé Editores)
Jennifer Gonzalez (The Librarian)
Dancer: Sun Hee Engelstoft Craig Owens, Beyond Recognition
Voiceovers: Vera Maeder, Runo Lagomarsino Rosalind Krauss, The Originality of the Avant-Garde
Sound assistance: Karl Fitzke
Harold Rosenberg, The Anxious Object
The library and the archive as sites of knowledge and Steven Toulmin & Allen Janik, Wittgenstein’s Vienna
power are scrutinized through a number of characters
representing different subject positions. These William H. Gass, On Being Blue
positions are based on interviews with people who Ann Goldstein & Mary Jane Jacob, eds., A Forest of
are, in various ways, related to the archive or library. Signs (exh. cat.)
The Royal Archivist represents he who decides which
photographs are included or excluded in a National Dave Hickey, The Invisible Dragon
image collection. The Conceptual Collector is an artist
who elaborates on the systematization of knowledge, Michel Leiris, Brisées (translated by Lydia Davis)
while The Unnamable, played by a dancer, is a trickster John Fowles, The Ebony Tower
character only communicating through movement,
neither included, nor completely excluded from the Susan Stewart, On Longing
archive. The Anarchist and The Librarian have more Charles Rosen & Henri Zwirner,
critical attitudes towards the relationship between Romanticism & Realism
knowledge and power. While The Anarchist has tried to
unveil the secrecy surrounding prominent people who Franz Kafka, The Metamorphosis and Other Stories
were members of Nazi organizations, The Librarian (translated by Joachim Neugroschel)
elaborates on the consequences the USA Patriot Act has Italo Calvino, Invisible Cities
had on issues of privacy rights and intellectual freedom. (translated by William Weaver)
Jane Jin Kaisen is a visual artist working in an Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray
interdisciplinary mode, with film, video, performance, Sanford Schwartz, Artists and Writers
text, and photography. Using reversed strategies and
constructing multi-layered and non-linear narratives, Yve-Alain Bois, Painting as Model
her work attempts to complicate notions of subjectivity,
discourse, and ideology. Jane Jin is educated at Guy Davenport, Tatlin!
the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts and is Claude Simon, Triptych
currently on a Fulbright scholarship at the Whitney (translated by Helen R. Lane)
Museum Independent Study Program in New York.
www.janejinkaisen.org Julia Kristeva, Tales of Love
(translated by Leon S. Roudiez)
Sponsored by the Danish Arts Foundation
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Janet Koenig, The Autobiography of J. Edgar Hoover
(2007) Mock book cover with eyeball [11”x 9”x 2.75”]
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Jeff de Castro, Odd Infinitum (2007)
Four mirrored carts made of wood, mirrors, acetate,
flashlight and headrest [3”x 24” x 34”]
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Martha Rosler, Bringing the War Home: House
Beautiful Series: Photo Op, 2004 (see catalogue cover)
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Rit
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title: no artwork
year: 2004
material: no material used
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DON’T EVEN THINK ABOUT IT
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