An interview with Alexis Smith conducted 2014 January 24 and April 14, by Hunter Drohojowska-Philp, for the Archives of American Art at Smith's studio, in Venice, California.
Ms. Smith discusses growing up in Southern California and her early years living with her parents on the grounds of Metropolitan State Hospital, a mental institution in Norwalk, California; her mother's death when Ms. Smith was 11; the family's time in Whittier and Palm Springs and being raised as an only child by her father; her early interest in French studies and travel to France as a student; her interest in studying art beginning with a John Coplans class at UC Irvine; her time at at UC Irvine in the early days of the university and her growing attraction to the life of an artist; the origin of her name Alexis Smith; and the encouragement of her fellow artists to continue pursuing her cut-up collages from literature, photos, magazines, and Hollywood ephemera. Ms. Smith also describes her time with her artist women's group in the 70s; her husband Scott Grieger; working for Frank Gehry; her showing with the Nicholas Wilder Gallery; her relationship with Chris Burden and her time with him during his period of performance pieces in the 70s; the Riko Mizuno Gallery; her work with terrazzo and its use for installations at the LA Convention Center, Ohio State University, and other installations; the appropriation of text and the assistance of Jerry Solomon utilizing custom frames in her artwork; the impact of women from history, media and literature on her art; her relationship with Coy Howard; the Holly Solomon Gallery; her Jane series; her On the Road series; her installation Snake Path at UC San Diego; her piece for SITE Santa Fe Red Carpet; teaching at UCLA; her installation of the piece Scarlet Letter at Las Vegas Central Library and its subsequent removal; her associations with Margo Leavin Gallery and Honor Fraser gallery; and the loss of her long-time studio space and the challenges of storing her artwork. Ms. Smith also recalls Judy Chicago, Robert Irwin, Vija Celmins, Larry Bell, Barbara Burden, Richard Sedivy, Avilda Moses, Craig Krull, and Allen Ruppersberg among others.
Biographical / Historical:
Alexis Smith (1949- ) is a collage, multimedia, and installation artist in Los Angeles, California. Hunter Drohojowska-Philp is an art critic and writer from Beverly Hills, California.
General:
Originally recorded as 5 sound files. Duration is 3 hr., 11 min.
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:
Transcript available on the Archives of American Art website.
Occupation:
Collagists -- California -- Los Angeles Search this
Visual Arts and the AIDS Epidemic: An Oral History Project Search this
Type:
Interviews
Sound recordings
Citation:
Quotes and excerpts must be cited as follows: Oral history interview with Frederick Weston, 2016 August 31-September 5. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
The papers of New York video artist and painter Robert Wiegand measure 10.9 linear feet and 0.001 GB and date from 1953 to 1994. Found within the collection are biographical materials, correspondence, art project and exhibition files, printed abd digital materials, video art, photographs, and industrial and miscellaneous video recordings. About one-half of the collection is comprised of video recordings.
Scope and Contents:
The papers of New York video artist and painter Robert Wiegand measure 10.9 linear feet and 0.001 GB and date from 1953 to 1994. Found within the collection are biographical materials, correspondence, art project and exhibition files, printed and digital materials, video art, photographs, and industrial and miscellaneous video recordings. About one-half of the collection is comprised of video recordings.
Biographical materials include school yearbooks, video and paper documentation from his 1991 wedding, and photograph and video documentation of his funeral and memorial service in 1994. Also found are resumes and Wiegand's SoHo live/work artist permit from 1976.
Correspondence is comprised primarily of letters written by Wiegand, some in digital format, and a handful of letters received. Outgoing letters mainly concern Wiegand's video production work for hire and other personal financial matters. Letters received relate primarily to Wiegand's painting sales, and are from James McLeon, Vivian Browne, Susan Larson, Burt Chernow, and Alexandra Rose. Additional correspondence can be found in the project files.
Project files include documentation of the 1968 inagural "10 Downtown" exhibition, the City Walls mural project, a multimedia art work created through the Experiments in Art and Technology (EAT) project called Changes, the products of the 1978 trip to India, including the video work Snapshots of an Indian Day, the "Madama Butterfly" video production produced by Wiegand, and the artist panel series ArtistsTalkonArt. The files contain a wide variety of documentation, such as correspondence, event flyers and press materials, photographs, slides, and videos.
Printed materials include exhibition and event announcements and catalogs, clippings and reviews, magazine publications, and published books that contain Wiegand's work. There is also one scrapbook compiled by Wiegand for his 5th One Man Show of Paintings at the Phoenix Gallery in New York City.
Video artworks created by Wiegand, often made in collaboration with his wife Ingrid, include Georges, Julie, Moran, Omar is El Uno, Nat, Walking (interstices), Face-Off, and How to tell an artist with Dr. Sheldon Cholst. Photographs include a combination of personal and professional photographs, although most of the materials are slides of artworks and events. Of note are slides from the "Bicentennial Banners" exhibition that Wiegand was invited to participate in and that was on display at the Smithsonian's Hirshhorn Museum in 1976.
The last series contains over 4 linear feet of all other video recordings and includes industry productions, independent projects, performance documentation, work samples, and works by others. Notable among these productions are documentation of Pamela Stockwell's reenactment of the Tomkins Square Park riots of 1988 and footage of performers Carolee Schneemann, Trisha Brown, Laura Foreman, and Leonard Horowitz, among others.
Arrangement:
The collection is arranged as seven series.
Missing Title
Series 1: Biographical Material, 1953-1994 (Boxes 1-2, 11; 1.5 linear feet)
Series 2: Correspondence and Letters, 1962-1990 (Box 2; .3 linear feet, ER01; 0.001 GB)
Series 3: Project Files, 1968-1992 (Boxes 2-3, 11; 1.1 linear feet)
Series 4: Printed Materials, 1959-1990 (Boxes 3-4, 11; .7 linear feet)
Series 5: Video Art, 1970-1982 (Boxes 4-5; 1 linear feet)
Series 6: Photographs, 1953-1994 (Boxes 5-6; 1 linear feet)
Series 7: Other Video Recordings, 1968-1992 (Boxes 6-10; 4.7 linear feet)
Biographical / Historical:
Robert Nelson Wiegand (1934-1994) was a painter and video artist who worked and lived in New York City. Robert Wiegand's interest in art extended well beyond the point of creation, and throughout his life he worked not only as painter, but also as a teacher, advocate, and documentarian of the arts in New York City.
Born in Long Island in 1934, Wiegand attended the State University of New York, College of Buffalo and received a degree in arts education. He returned to New York City and became active in the artist community in SoHo. He was one of the co-founders of the SoHo Artists Association, an artists' organization formed to advocate for legalizing artist loft live/work spaces in lower Manhattan in the 1960s.
Wiegand married his first wife Ingrid in 1964, and they collaborated on many creative endeavors. They adopted two children from India, Indira and Pratap (also known as Peter), and separated in 1990. He married painter Lynn Braswell in 1991.
As a painter, Wiegand's work was highly geometric and influenced by the Abstract Expressionist movement. He exhibited paintings in one-man shows in New York City at the Phoenix Gallery and at the Levitan Gallery. In 1968, Wiegand participated in the first "10 Downtown" exhibition, where artists exhibited in their own studios in a move to overcome exclusive gallery representation practices. After painting a few exterior house murals, Wiegand co-founded City Walls, a New York City mural project that was funded by the National Endowment for the Arts. Through this project he became responsible for a handful of the murals in lower Manhattan. In 1968, Wiegand collaborated with Lloyed Kreutzer, a Bell Labs physicist specializing in lasers, to create the installation work Changes as part of Experiments In Art and Technology's (EAT) 1968 competition bringing together artists and engineers. It was then shown at Wiegand's studio in 1969. Wiegand was also one of the co-founders of ArtistsTalkOnArt, an artist run non-profit organization that continues to program weekly artist panel discussions in Soho, NY. It was co-founded in 1974 by Wiegand, Lori Antonacci, and Douglas Sheer, with Irving Sandler, Cynthia Navaretta, Bruce Barton and Corinne Robins joining the first board of directors in early 1975.
Wiegand became interested in video in the 1960s after using it as a documentary tool in the successful effort to legalize loft living in lower Manhattan. He then began creating video artworks, many of which were collaborations with his wife Ingrid. They received a grant from the Rockefeller Foundation in 1977 to produce a documentary on middle class life in India called Snapshots of an Indian Day. It was shown at The Kitchen and Anthology Film Archives before being acquired by the Everson Museum of Art in Syracuse, NY. In 1980, with the help of his students from the Global Village Intensive Video Workshop, Wiegand directed, shot, and edited the Brooklyn Opera Society's production Madama Butterfly at the Brooklyn Botanical Gardens and Tea House, and the production aired on WNYC-TV 13 as part of its Other Voices: New York series.
From 1971 to 1980, Wiegand ran his own commercial video company, Wiegand Video, where he produced corporate and industry training films. From 1980 to 1987, he worked as a project manager and producer for Square Twelve Productions, continuing to produce commercial work. His clients included the American Society for Mechanical Engineers and International Business Machines.
Wiegand also taught art and video production at the Staten Island Academy from 1961-1971, studio and television production at the New School for Social Research from 1980 to 1984, and field production at the Lehman College City University of NY. He also taught in the New York City C.E.T.A. program in media training and was a visiting media production instructor at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro.
Towards the end of his life, Wiegand changed careers and became a social worker. Robert Wiegand died in New York City in 1994, just after his 60th birthday.
Separated Materials:
Twenty sound cassettes of interviews and lectures were removed from the collection and returned to the organization that created them, ArtistsTalkOnArt. A few video cassettes are still found in the collection from that series.
Provenance:
The collection was donated by Lynn Braswell, Robert Wiegand's widow, in 1998 and 2000.
Restrictions:
Use of archival audiovisual recordings with no duplicate access copy requires advance notice. Use of original papers requires an appointment.
Rights:
The donor has retained all intellectual property rights, including copyright, that they may own.
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:
Video artists -- New York (State) -- New York Search this
Painters -- New York (State) -- New York Search this
Genre/Form:
Photographs
Video recordings
Citation:
Robert Wiegand papers and video art, 1953-1994. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
Sponsor:
Funding for the processing of this collection was provided by by a grant from the Mellon Foundation through the Council of Library and Information Resources' Hidden Collections grant program.
An interview with Frederick Weston, conducted 2016 August 31 and September 5, by Theodore Kerr, for the Archives of American Art's Visual Arts and the AIDS Epidemic: An Oral History Project, at Weston's home in New York, N.Y.
Weston speaks of his childhood in Detroit; early understandings of his gender; attending Ferris State University in Michigan; moving to New York in 1973; New York nightclub culture before the AIDS crisis; studying at FIT and working in the fashion industry; beginning to consider himself an artist in the late 1990s after years of collage work in street settings; being diagnosed with HIV in the mid-1990s; imbuing his art with his personal experience; his body of work in photography, installations, and poetry; his health care and regiment since being diagnosed with HIV; evolutions in his personal outlook since being diagnosed; the trajectory of his sex life from adolescence; moving into his current apartment in Chelsea; and reflections on America's racial situation. Weston also recalls Claude Payne, Apollonia, Billy Blair, Stephanie Crawford, Franz Renard Smith, Dr. Joseph Sonnabend, Bruce Benderson, and others.
Biographical / Historical:
Interviewee Frederick Weston (1946- ) is a multimedia artist in New York, N.Y. Interviewer Theodore Kerr (1979- ) is a writer and organizer in New York, N.Y.
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.
The archive is comprised of the papers of the artist (his writings, notes, scores, plans and designs, photographs and assorted print ephemera), his library (books, magazines, trade catalogs, etc.), as well as three dimensional artifacts from his studio (objects, toys, televisions, radios, the artist's desk, etc.) and over 200 videotapes (the artist's single-channel videotapes, installation videotapes, and videotape records of performances and interviews).
Scope and Contents:
The papers of Nam June Paik measure approximately 55 linear feet and date from 1832 to 2008, with the bulk of materials dating from 1960 to 2000. The papers document the artist's global career in video and multimedia art. The collection includes the artist's early writings on art, history and technology, performance scores, production notes for videotape and television products, plans for video installations, and documentation of large-scale television projects such as Guadalcanal Requiem (1977/79) and The More the Better (1988).
Letters, postcards, telegrams, faxes and notes from friends and business associates reflect Paik's association with a wide international circle of artists, including many of those associated with Fluxus. Biographical materials include vintage photographs, an early affidavit of support from Jonas Mekas for Paik's temporary entry into the United States and the transcript of a 1977 interview conducted by Dick Higgins.
Additional materials that provide insight into Paik's career include documentation of early Fluxus performances both before and after Paik's move to New York City in 1964 and printed announcements and programs for exhibitions, festivals, and performances.
Also included in the papers are over 400 books and magazines.
Arrangement:
The collection is arranged into fourteen series:
Series 1: Biographical Materials, 1957-1999 (Box 1; 10 folders; .20 linear feet)
Series 2. Correspondence, 1959-2002 (Boxes 1-4 and oversize box 51; 74 folders, 1.5 linear feet)
Series 3. Financial and Legal Records,1965-2002 (Boxes 5-6; 27 folders; .8 linear feet)
Series 4. Project Files, ca. 1965-1998 (Boxes 7-10 and oversize boxes 52-53, 66 folders; 2 linear feet)
Series 5: Exhibition Files, 1974-2002 (Box 10 and oversize box 53; 19 folders; .3 linear feet)
Series 6: Notes and Writings, ca. 1960-2000 (Boxes 11-15 and oversize box 54; 112 folders; 2.1 linear feet)
Series 7: Sketchbooks and Sketches, 1974-1979 and undated (Box 16 and oversize box 54; 9 folders; .1 linear feet)
Series 8: Photographs, ca. 1940-2001 (Boxes 16-17 and oversize boxes 55 and 57; 36 folders; .9 linear feet)
Series 9: Artifacts and Ephemera, ca. 1960-2000 (Box 18 and oversize box 55; 17 folders; .5 linear feet)
Series 10: Printed Materials, 1832-2004 (Boxes 19-25 and oversize boxes 56-63; 121 folders; 10 linear feet)
Series 11: Books, 1839-2003 (Boxes 25-40 and oversize box 66; 17 linear feet)
Series 12: Magazines and Newsletters, ca. 1900-2000 (Boxes 41-46; 6 linear feet)
Series 13: Product Manuals, Trade Catalogs and Directories, ca. 1970-2000 (Boxes 47-50; 4 linear feet)
Series 14: Newspapers, 1867-2008 (Oversize boxes 62-65; 9.5 linear feet)
Biographical note:
Nam June Paik (1932-2006), internationally recognized as the "Father of Video Art," created a large body of work, including video sculptures, installations, performances, videotapes and television productions. His art and ideas embodied a radical new vision for an art form that changed global visual culture.
Born in 1932 in Seoul, Korea, to a wealthy industrial family, Paik and his family fled Korea in 1950 at the outset of the Korean War, first to Hong Kong, then to Japan. Paik graduated from the University of Tokyo in 1956, and then traveled to Germany to pursue his interest in avant-garde music, composition and performance. There he met John Cage and George Maciunas and became a member of the neo-dada Fluxus movement. In 1963, Paik had his legendary one-artist exhibition at the Galerie Parnass in Wuppertal, Germany, that featured his prepared television sets, which radically altered the look and content of television.
After immigrating to the United States in 1964, he settled in New York City, where he expanded his engagement with video and television, and had exhibitions of his work at the New School, Galerie Bonino, and the Howard Wise Gallery. In 1965, Paik was one of the first artists to use a portable video camcorder. In 1969, he worked with Japanese engineer Shuya Abe to construct an early video-synthesizer that allowed Paik to combine and manipulate images from different sources. The Paik-Abe video synthesizer transformed electronic moving-image making. Paik invented a new artistic medium with television and video, creating an astonishing array of artworks, from his seminal video Global Groove (1973), to his sculptures TV Buddha (1974) and TV Cello (1971); to installations such as TV Garden (1974), Video Fish (1975) and Fin de Siecle II (1989); videotapes Living with Living Theatre (1989) and Guadalcanal Requiem (1977/1979); and global satellite television productions such as Good Morning Mr. Orwell, which broadcast from the Centre Pompidou in Paris and a WNET-TV studio in New York City January 1, 1984.
Paik has been the subject of numerous exhibitions, including the major retrospectives: Nam June Paik, organized by Tate Liverpool and museum kunst palast, Düsseldorf (2011); The Worlds of Nam June Paik organized by the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York City (2000); and Nam June Paik, organized by the Whitney Museum of American Art (1982). He has been featured in major international art exhibitions including Documenta, the Venice Biennale, and the Whitney Biennial.
Provenance:
In 2009, the Nam June Paik archive was received as a gift from the Nam June Paik estate.
Restrictions:
Access to the archive requires an advance appointment. Please contact Paik Archive staff by email at PaikArchive@si.edu.
Rights:
Unpublished materials are protected by copyright. Permission to publish, quote, or reproduce must be secured from the repository and the copyright holder.
Topic:
Art, Modern -- 20th century -- United States Search this
The papers of New York City and Berlin, Germany based multi-media and conceptual artist Matt Mullican measure 27.8 linear feet and date from circa 1968-2017. The collection consists of biographical material, including a few interview transcripts; correspondence; over 100 notebooks; gallery and exhibition files; project and commission files; personal business records; printed material; and photographs. The notebooks document nearly five decades of Mullican's work process and illustrate his material and conceptual explorations. Large sequences of gallery and exhibition files, as well as project and commission files comprise the remaining bulk of the collection, providing detailed documentation of his professional career, particularly from the 1980s-2000s.
Scope and Contents:
The papers of New York City and Berlin, Germany based multi-media and conceptual artist Matt Mullican measure 27.8 linear feet and date from circa 1968-2017. The collection consists of biographical material, including a few interview transcripts; correspondence; over 100 notebooks; gallery and exhibition files; project and commission files; personal business records; printed material; and photographs. The notebooks document nearly five decades of Mullican's work process and illustrate his material and conceptual explorations. Large sequences of gallery and exhibition files, as well as project and commission files comprise the remaining bulk of the collection, providing detailed documentation of his professional career, particularly from the 1980s-2000s.
Biographical material includes address books, high school and college ephemera, papers and photographs relating to Mullican's family, identification cards, interview transcripts, a resume, and a few writings.
The small amount of correspondence arranged in Series 2 is with friends, artists, colleagues, fans, and museum professionals. Notable correspondents include artist Lawrence Weiner and museum director Kasper König. Additional professional correspondence is located in the Gallery and Exhibition Files, as well as the Project and Commission Files.
Over 100 notebooks document nearly five decades of Mullican's work process and artistic explorations from the time he was a student up to the present.
A large sequence of gallery and exhibition files encompass a variety of material documenting Mullican's extensive solo and group exhibition history throughout the United States, Europe, and Japan.
Extensive project and commission files contain documentation of international public and corporate commissions, academic engagements, performances, publishing projects, print editions, illustrations, grants, residencies, and other project based artwork. Public and corporate commissions include artworks and installations for banks, airports, office complexes, university buildings, public transit stations, and other spaces.
Personal business records relate to bookkeeping and sales, donations, inventories, publication, copyright, supplies, invoicing, recommendations, residences, storage of works, and studio administration.
Printed material includes announcements, posters, articles, reviews, exhibition catalogs, and periodicals related to Mullican's career.
One folder of photographs documents Mullican, his family, and installations of his work at various venues and exhibitions.
Arrangement:
The collection is arranged as eight series.
Missing Title
Series 1: Biographical Material, 1968-2002 (0.6 linear feet; Box 1)
Series 2: Correspondence, 1986-2000s (0.2 linear feet; Box 1)
Series 3: Notebooks, circa 1968-2017 (7.2 linear feet; Box 1-8)
Series 4: Gallery and Exhibition Files, 1985-2000s (6.1 linear feet; Box 9-13, OV and RD 23-25)
Series 5: Project and Commission Files, 1980-2000s (10.3 linear feet; Box 14-19, OV and RD 26-43)
Series 6: Personal Business Records, 1978-2000s (1.7 linear feet; Box 19-21)
Series 7: Printed Material, 1971-2000s (1.5 linear foot; Box 21-22, RD 44)
Series 8: Photographs, 1980s-1990s (1 folder; Box 22)
Biographical / Historical:
Matt Mullican (1951- ) is a multi-media and conceptual artist working in New York City and Berlin, Germany. Born in Santa Monica, he is the son of abstract surrealist painters Lee Mullican and Luchita Hurtado Mullican. Educated at the California Institute of the Arts (CalArts) in the early 1970s, and mentored by John Baldessari, Mullican moved to New York City after earning his BFA and became associated with the "Pictures Generation" artists, including friends Troy Brauntuch, Jack Goldstein, James Welling, and Robert Longo. His multi-disciplinary practice encompasses drawing, painting, collage, video, installation, and performance under hypnosis as his alter ego, 'That Person.' Through these media, Mullican explores systems of knowledge, the construction of reality, as well as meaning, language, and signs. Throughout his career, Mullican has participated in international solo and group exhibitions, and has undertaken dozens of public and corporate commissions.
Provenance:
Donated to the Archives of American Art in 2014-2017 by Matt Mullican.
Restrictions:
Use of original papers requires an appointment and is limited to the Archives' Washington, D.C. Research Center. Use of born-digital records requires advance notice.
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:
Conceptual artists -- Germany -- Berlin -- Interviews Search this
Conceptual artists -- New York (State) -- New York -- Interviews Search this
Topic:
Artists -- New York (State) -- New York -- Interviews Search this
An interview with Doug Aitken conducted 2017 July 22 and 24, by Hunter Drohojowska-Philp, for the Archives of American Art, at Aitken's home in Venice Beach, California.
Mr. Aitken discusses growing up and his early schooling in Palos Verdes, California, and his first introductions to making art at a young age; his parents intellectual curiosity and his early visits with them to museums in the Los Angeles area; the family's many travels to the Southwest, Latin America and Europe, as well as his subsequent travels hitchhiking alone as a teenager; the impact of his high school art teacher Chizuko de Queiroz; his time as a young teenager exploring the new wave and punk rock scenes in the Los Angeles area; his time at the Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, California and the mentorship there of the illustrator and artist Phil Hays; his focus on photography and illustration and his work for the magazine Ray Gun in the '90s; his decision to move to New York City after graduating from Art Center and his first artist studio residence there with Lawrence Carroll; his almost monastic life at first in New York City working on art with very little social interaction; his first ideas for an artwork using moving image and his first use of film and video; the impact of the concept of "timecode" from video editing and its application as a construct with which to perceive time and consciousness; and his early art exhibitions in non-commercial spaces with the AC Project Room group in New York. Mr. Aitken also describes his multimedia work Diamond Sea and the filming for it in Namibia; his first commercial art gallery shows at 303 Gallery in New York City; his current MOCA retrospective Electric Earth; his piece Song 1 and the inspiration for it; the ideas behind the performance and exhibition series Station to Station that was realized on trains and train stations with the help of many fellow artists and his studio assistants; his mirrored architectural work Mirage in Palm Springs; the mirrored ocean environmental works Underwater Pavilions; the appeal of the ocean and the story of his drowning and near-death experience; the ideas behind his work Migration using animals and anonymous American hotel rooms; his multiscreen film Eraser shot on the island of Montserrat after the volcanic devastation there; the impact of the work of the musician Terry Riley on his art and their subsequent friendship and collaboration; his romantic relationships; the work done building his current house in Venice, California, and his incorporation of sonic elements and visual interplay in the house's construction; his many conversations with artist friends and colleagues and the subsequent use of them in his book Broken Screen; and the recent work Twilight using abandoned telephone booths as inspiration. Mr. Aitken also recalls Jorge Prado, Mike Kelley, Stephen Prina, Keith Edmier, Matthew Barney, Paul Bloodgood, Rirkrit Tiravanija, Spike Jonze, Philippe Vergne, Harald Szeemann, Francesco Bonami, Okwui Enwezor, as well as Tilda Swinton, John Doe, Donald Sutherland, Werner Herzog, Bruce Conner, Lisa Spellman, Ed Ruscha, Werner Herzog, Eva Presenhuber, Victoria Miro, Robert Altman, and Lars von Trier, among others.
Biographical / Historical:
Interviewee Doug Aitken (1968- ) is a multimedia artist based in Venice, California and New York, New York. Interviewer Hunter Drohojowska-Philp is a writer in Los Angeles, California.
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:
Audio: ACCESS RESTRICTED; use requires an appointment.
The papers of artist and art educator Mel Alexenberg measure 1.8 linear feet and date from circa 1950-1980. Included are correspondence, project files, sketches, notes, printed material and slides of works of art.
Biographical / Historical:
Mel Alexenberg (1937- ) is an artist and art educator in New York, New York and Ra'anana, Israel.
Provenance:
Donated 2018 by Mel Alexenberg.
Restrictions:
Use of original papers requires an appointment and is limited to the Archives' Washington, D.C., Research Center.
The papers of multimedia artist and educator, Elaine Galen, measure 2.6 linear feet and date from circa 1950-2020. Included is biographical information, correspondence, education files, writings, subject files, photographs of works of art, drawings, and printed material.
Biographical information includes an artist's statement and a resume; lists of works of art and collections; two DVDs "Elaine Galen: The State of the Art, undated; a CD of an interview with Galen "Celebrating 76 years of Creativity and Vision, Elisa Contemporary Art", undated; and a DVD "Out of the Heart of the Lion", undated. Correspondence is between Galen and museums regarding donations and exhibitions as well as letters of recommendation from colleagues. Materials relating to Galen's academic career include her dissertation proposal, various syllabi, essays and lectures. Writings by Galen consist of unpublished manuscripts and poems. Subject files concern a 1972 solo show at Hunterdon Art Center, Clinton, NJ. Photographs are of Galen and her works of art. Artwork includes a sketchbook and loose drawings. Printed material consists of books by Galen, exhibition announcements and catalogs, auction catalogs, invitations, articles, newspaper clippings, posters and miscellany.
Biographical / Historical:
Elaine Galen (1928- ) is a multi-media painter, sculptor, and educator in Mount Kisco, N.Y.
Related Materials:
The Archives of American Art also holds the papers of artist Ed Colker, Elaine Galen's husband.
Provenance:
Donated 2007, 2013, 2020 and 2021 by Elaine Galen.
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 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.
An interview of Regina Vater conducted 2004 February 23-25, by Cary Cordova, for the Archives of American Art, in her home in Austin, Texas.
Vater speaks of her childhood in Copacabana, Ipanema, south of Rio de Janeiro; her father's career as a physician; her Basque, Portuguese, and Jewish heritage; her early education including early experiences with Greek philosophy; her parents' reaction to her desire to be an artist; her great-grandfather's translation of Virgil and Homer into Portuguese; her study abroad in France in 1972; her move to New York in the mid-1970s; her motivations for various works of art, including the series Gentle Solitude, Three Chinese Monkeys, Luxo Lixo, Electronic Nature, The Knots, Tina America, and "O Que e Arte?"; her Guggenheim fellowship in 1981; the 1976 Whitney Biennial; her marriage to video installation artist Bill Lundberg; her move to Austin, Tex.; her work with the Franklin Furnace Gallery and Flue magazine; her involvement with "cinema verité"; making films with Ruth Escobar; her travels in Buenos Aires, Argentina, Lima, Peru, Bolivia, and Colombia; her perception of the emotional differences between Latinos and Americans; her love of Brazilian culture; her own classification of her work and potential reasons for the lack of scholarship on her work; her activities as a curator including the 1984 show "Latin American Visual Thinking," at the Art Awareness Gallery in New York, N.Y.; difficulties with the Brazilian government in attempting to bring her film Green into that country; her love of poetry, especially concrete poetry; and the spirituality of her work. Vater also recalls Helio Oiticica, Lygia Clark, Frank Schaeffer, Antonio Diaz, Carlos Vergara, Rubens Gerschman, Mario Schemberg, Lucy Lippard, Augustos de Campos, John Cage, Joseph Beuys, Quentin Fiore, Tomasso Trinino, Bill Lundberg [the artist's husband], Leo Castelli, Dore Ashton, Nam June Paik, Charlotte Moorman, Sophie Calle, Nelson Pereira dos Santos, Ruth Escobar, Antonio Pitanga, Bobby Wilson, Sylvia Orozco, Bill Viola, Ana Mendieta, Martha Wilson, Catalina Parra, Liliana Porter, and others.
Biographical / Historical:
Regina Vater (1943-) is a Brazilian born multimedia artist from Austin, Texas. Cary Cordova (1970-) is an art historian from Austin, Texas.
General:
Originally recorded on 4 sound discs and 1 compact disc. Duration is 5 hr., 10 min.
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:
Transcript available on the Archives of American Art website.
This interview is part of the series "Recuerdos Orales: Interviews of the Latino Art Community in Texas," supported by Federal funds for Latino programming, administered by the Smithsonian Center for Latino Initiatives.
The digital preservation of this interview received Federal support from the Latino Initiatives Pool, administered by the Smithsonian Latino Center.
An interview of Marilyn Minter conducted 2011 Nov. 29-30, by Judith Olch Richards, for the Archives of American Art, at Minter's studio, in New York, N.Y.
Minter speaks of her childhood and parents, including a body of work surrounding her drug addled mother that introduced her to photography; her years as a student of Jerry Uelsmann at University of Florida; time speat working as a plumber, which eventuated in a job with Kenneth Snelson; Brief time as an abstract expressionist with Christophe Colehauffer; rise to sobriety; shows with Max Protetch; shows at Gracie Manor, White Columns, and Nicola Jacobs in the late 80s; series Money, Food Porn and Porn, based on necessities to live; subsequent ostricization for the Porn series; teaching at the School of Visual Art; her preference for eliminating the context of the subject of her work; collaborations with Jeanne Meyers; her style and process, including her team of staff who help create her paintings; emergent use of film, including a Phantom 25,000 fps slo-mo camera; Minter's thoughts on women in the art world and feminist ideologies and women supporting each other; her work in commercial photography, including shooting for Tom Ford and Versace as well as various other companies; series of work featuring Pamela Anderson; shows at the Whitney Biennial and SF MoMA; the project Creative Time and Minter's work with billboards; repeated collaborations with Salon 94; Minter's films Green Pink Caviar and I'm Not Much But I'm All I Think About. Minter also recalls Jerry Uelsmann, Tom DeSchmidt, Max Protetch, Christophe Colehauffer, Mary Heilmann, Mike Ballou, Kenneth Snelson, Neville Wakefield and Shea Spencer, Anne Pasternak, Jimmy De Sana, various students taught over the years, and others.
Biographical / Historical:
Marilyn Minter (1948- ) is a multimedia artist in New York, N.Y. Judith Olch Richards (1947- ) is an independent writer and curator in New York, N.Y.
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 transcript is open for research. Access to the entire recording is restricted. Contact Reference Services for more information.
Occupation:
Multimedia artists -- New York (State) -- New York Search this
An interview with Andrea Zittel conducted 2018 January 8 and 9, by Hunter Drohojowska-Philp, for the Archives of American Art, at the artist's studio in Joshua Tree, California.
Zittel discusses life as an artist and designer at her studio and production company A-Z West in Joshua Tree; growing up in Escondido, California and visiting her grandparents' ranch in El Centro, California as a child and the attraction she felt to the desert; her year in Germany as a schoolchild; her rebellious years as a teenager; her undergraduate work at San Diego State University, her studies of photography and art there and the influence of the photographer Walter Cotten; her subsequent graduate work at the Rhode Island School of Design; her work on the staff at Pat Hearn Gallery; her purchase of a building in Brooklyn and the establishment of A-Z East; her work with breeding animals and insects in her apartment and her living spaces and the first Breeding Unit; the creation of her first self-contained Living Unit; her work with custom-designed uniforms meant for long-term wear; and her early success with significant mid-'90s shows at galleries and museums in the United States and Europe.
Zittel also describes her relocation from New York to Joshua Tree in the Mojave Desert; her relationship with the artist Allan McCollum; her expanding series of sculptural furniture and living pieces including Fleds, Ottoman Furniture, Travel Trailers and the Management and Maintenance Unit; life in the Mojave Desert and the historical impact of the post-war Homestead Act on her part of San Bernardino County; her son Emmett and his father David Dodge; her partner, the musician Katy Davidson; the integration of textiles and handcraft in her work; her work with the arts organization High Desert Test Sites; her clothing production effort Smockshop; and her thoughts about having A-Z West be self-sustaining and creating a legacy.
Zittel also recalls Gillian Theobald; Janet Cooling; Rob Storr; Peter Watson; Andrea Rosen; Dan Wineman; Rainer Ganahl; Craig Kalpakjian; Mike Ballou as well as Klaus Biesenbach; Sebastian Clough; Shaun Regen; Kip Fjeld; Judith Solodkyne; and Brooke Hodge, among others.
Biographical / Historical:
Andrea Zittel (1965- ) is a multimedia artist based in Joshua Tree, California and New York, New York. Hunter Drohojowska-Philp is a writer in Los Angeles, California.
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:
The transcript and audio recording are open for research. Contact Reference Services for more information.
Occupation:
Artists -- New York (State) -- New York Search this
An interview of Elaine Sturtevant conducted 2007 July 25-26, by Bruce Hainley and Michael Lobel, for the Archives of American Art, at the Archives of American Art, in New York, New York.
Sturtevant speaks of her exhibitions, Raw Power at Galerie Thaddaeus Ropac in Paris 2007; Cold Fear at the Anthony Reynolds Gallery in London, 2006; Brutal Truth at the Museum für Moderne Kunst, Frankfurt, Germany, 2004; America America at Galerie J in Paris in 1966; Sturtevant at the Bianchini Gallery in New York in 1965; and others. She also talks about her work Hate Kill Falsity, 2006; the process of installing shows to present a totality of work instead of individual pieces; the concept of "copy" and its misattributions in her art; her interest in opening minds and engendering thinking; her master's degree in language and interest in the writings of Gilles Deleuze and Michel Foucault; possessing confidence in her work to continue creating amidst years of misunderstanding and criticism; Abstract Expressionism and Pop art as catalysts in developing the philosophical concept of her work; frustration at being asked personal questions about the artists she was associated with; the reception of her art in Europe; using video as a medium to articulate visibility; and welcoming different interpretations of her work. Sturtevant also recalls Thaddaeus Ropac, Anthony Reynolds, Udo Kittelmann, Anselm Kiefer, Jasper Johns, Robert Rauschenberg, Andy Warhol, Hans-Ulrich Obrist, Beatrix Ruf, Claude Givaudan, Claes Oldenburg; Marcel Duchamp, Paul Maenz, Joseph Kosuth, and others.
Biographical / Historical:
Elaine Sturtevant (1924-2014) was a multi-media artist in Paris, France and New York, N.Y. Bruce Hainley is a writer from Los Angeles, California. Michael Lobel is an art historian from New York, New York.
General:
Originally recorded on 5 sound discs. Reformatted in 2010 as 9 digital wav files. Duration is 3 hr., 3 min.
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.
An interview of Vija Celmins conducted 2009 February 11-October 15, by Julia Brown, for the Archives of American Art, at the Celmins' home and studio, in New York, New York.
Celmins speaks of her family's Latvian roots; experiencing World War II as a child; surviving and overcoming the trauma of World War II; the difficulties of being a refugee and moving to the United States; the influence of books on her imagination and art; expressing herself through drawing after moving to Indiana; learning English; studying art at the John Herron School of Art; attending summer school at Yale University; moving to California to obtain her MFA at UCLA; using art to grapple with and understand both her past and her emotions; experimenting with various mediums; discovering the pencil as an art material; the difficulties of printmaking; experimenting with abstraction and Pop art; deciding to drop painting and collage work; finding her own artistic philosophy and practices; her love of nature and its impact on her work; not conforming to the male-dominated, L.A. art scene; her decision to leave L.A. for NYC. Celmins also speaks about Tony Berlant, Chas Garabedian, Ed Ruscha, David Stuart, Philip Guston, Chuck Close, Willem de Kooning, Brice Marden, Joan Mitchell, Robert Irwin, and Jasper Johns.
Biographical / Historical:
Vija Celmins (1938- ) is a multimedia artist in New York, New York. Julia Brown (1951- ) is an independent scholar in San Antonio, Texas.
General:
Originally recorded on 2 sound discs. Reformatted in 2010 as 5 digital wav files. Duration is 2 hr., 33 min.
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.
Occupation:
Painters -- New York (State) -- New York Search this
Multimedia artists -- New York (State) -- New York Search this
