Quotes and excerpts must be cited as follows: Oral history interview with Carrie Moyer, 2020 August 20. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
The papers of New York multimedia artist and educator Paul Ramírez Jonas, measure 6.3 linear feet and 19.73 GB and date from circa 1989-2014. The collection documents the work of this social practice artist through correspondence, exhibition and project files, and professional files, and provides relatively thorough coverage of Ramírez Jonas's work and development to late mid-career.
Scope and Contents:
The papers of New York multimedia artist and educator Paul Ramírez Jonas, measure 6.3 linear feet and 19.73 GB and date from circa 1989-2014. The collection documents the work of this social practice artist through correspondence, exhibition and project files, and professional files, and provides relatively thorough coverage of Ramírez Jonas's work and development to late mid-career.
Correspondence and personal files include greeting cards and postcards sent to Ramírez Jonas from individuals and galleries, and includes the artist's file arrangement lists documenting his organization of the records prior to donation to the Archives of American Art. Extensice email correspondence remains unprocessed.
Exhibition files provide a comprehensive survey of Ramírez Jonas's participation in group and solo exhibitions over more than two decades. Files include correspondence, notes, sketches, and printed, photographic and digital material for multiple exhibitions, and record Ramírez Jonas's relationships with gallery owners as well as the evolution and execution of many installations.
Project files provide a relatively comprehensive record of over two decades of projects, including large scale public art installations and smaller, more intimate projects, that trace evolving themes in Ramírez Jonas's work. Files include correspondence, architect's plans and schematic drawings, artist notes, financial and contractual records, printed and digital material, and photographs.
Professional files document other professional activities in which Ramírez Jonas was involved, such as boards and committees, conferences, panels, and seminars. Also found are a few files relating to teaching appointments, including documentation of his Combined Media Class at Hunter College.
Arrangement:
Prior to donation, Ramírez Jonas organized the bulk of his archives chronologically and thereafter into three categories which he titled "Shows," "Work," and "Other." This core arrangement has been maintained in the series Exhibition Files (Shows), Project Files (Work) and Professional Files (Other). A few additional files that did not fall into these three categories are arranged at the beginning of the collection as Series 1: Correspondence and Personal Files.
Series 1: Correspondence and Personal Files, 1991-circa 2014 (0.25 linear feet; Box 1, 2.20 GB; ER10)
Series 2: Exhibition Files, 1990-2009 (3.05 linear feet; Boxes 1-4, OV 7, 14.99 GB; ER01-ER05)
Series 3: Project Files, 1990-2014 (2.4 linear feet; Boxes 4-6, OVs 8-9, 2.54 GB; ER06-ER09)
Series 4: Professional Files, circa 1989-2014 (0.6 linear feet; Box 6, OV 8)
Biographical / Historical:
Paul Ramírez Jonas (1965-) is a multimedia artist and educator in New York, New York.
Ramírez Jonas was born in Pomona, California and raised in Honduras. He earned a BA in Studio Art and an MFA in Painting from the Rhode Island School of Design in 1989. As a social practice artist Ramírez Jonas explores definitions of art and the public and seeks to engage active audience participation in much of his work. He uses pre-existing texts, models, and materials in work ranging from monumental sculpture to smaller and more intimate projects involving drawings, textiles, musical instruments, video and performance art, and other media.
Ramírez Jonas has had an ongoing association with Creative Time, a public arts organization in New York City which funded, amongst other projects, his 2010 project Key to the City, in which he replaced locks around the city with new locks that could be opened with keys he distributed. Keys have had an important role in Ramírez Jonas's work; his Taylor Square park project in Cambridge, for example, juxtaposes the locked gates of the public space with 5000 keys he distributed to the public to be duplicated endlessly, as a symbol of "this relationship between public space and the public."
Ramírez Jonas is an educator who has taught at institutions including the Rhode Island School of Design and the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. He is currently an Associate Professor at Hunter College, City University of New York.
Provenance:
The collection was donated in 2015 and 2017 by Paul Ramírez Jonas.
Restrictions:
This collection is open for research. Access to original papers requires an appointment and is limited to the Archives' Washington, D.C. Research Center.
Researchers interested in accessing born-digital records or audiovisual recordings in this collection must use access copies. Contact References Services for more information.
Rights:
The Archives of American Art makes its archival collections available for non-commercial, educational and personal use unless restricted by copyright and/or donor restrictions, including but not limited to access and publication restrictions. AAA makes no representations concerning such rights and restrictions and it is the user's responsibility to determine whether rights or restrictions exist and to obtain any necessary permission to access, use, reproduce and publish the collections. Please refer to the Smithsonian's Terms of Use for additional information.
Occupation:
Educators -- New York (State) -- Brooklyn Search this
Multimedia artists -- New York (State) -- Brooklyn Search this
An interview with Carrie Moyer conducted 2020 August 20, by Benjamin Gillespie, for the Archives of American Art's Pandemic Oral History Project at Moyer's studio in Brooklyn, New York.
Biographical / Historical:
Carrie Moyer (1960- ) is a painter, activist, and educator in New York, NY. Moyer was co-founder of Dyke Action Machine! from 1991-2008 and is a professor and the Director of the MFA Program in Studio Art at Hunter College in Brooklyn.
Provenance:
This interview is part of the Archives of American Art Oral History Program, started in 1958 to document the history of the visual arts in the United States, primarily through interviews with artists, historians, dealers, critics and administrators.
Restrictions:
This interview is open for research.
Rights:
The Archives of American Art makes its Oral History Program interviews available for non-commercial, educational and personal use unless restricted by donor restrictions, including but not limited to access and publication restrictions. Quotation, reproduction and publication of the audio is governed by restrictions. If an interview has been transcribed, researchers must quote from the transcript. If an interview has not been transcribed, researchers must quote from the audio recording. Please refer to the Smithsonian's Terms of Use for additional information.
Occupation:
Painters -- New York (State) -- New York Search this
Political activists -- New York (State) -- New York Search this
Educators -- New York (State) -- New York Search this
Robert Motherwell and the New York School at Hunter / organized by Howard Singerman, with Sarah Watson, Annie Wischmeyer, and Jocelyn Spaar ; essay by Howard Singerman ; [artists]: William Baziotes, Fritz Bultman, Richard Lippold, Robert Motherwell, Ray Parker, George Sugarman
