George BRECHT

FLUXMANIFESTO ON FLUXAMUSEMENT - VAUDEVILLE - ART? TO ESTABLISH ARTISTS NONPROFESSIONAL, NONPARASITIC, NONELITE STATUS IN SOCIETY, HE MUST DEMONSTRATE OWN DISPENSABILITY, HE MUST DEMONSTRATE SELFSUFFICIENCY OF THE AUDIENCE, HE MUST DEMONSTRATE THAT ANYTHING CAN SUBSTITUTE ART AND ANYONE CAN DO IT. THEREFORE THIS SUBSTITUTE ART-AMUSEMENT MUST BE SIMPLE, AMUSING, CONCERNED WITH INSIGNIFICANCES, HAVE NO COMMODITY OR INSTITUIONAL VALUE. IT MUST BE UNLIMITED, OBTAINABLE BY ALL AND EVENTUALLY PRODUCED BY ALL. THE ARTIST DOING ART MEANWHILE, TO JUSTIFY HIS INCOME, MUST DEMONSTRATE THAT ONLY HE CAN DO ART. ART THEREFORE MUST APPEAR TO BE COMPLEX, INTELLECTUAL, EXCLUSIVE, INDISPENSABLE, INSPIRED. TO RAISE ITS COMMODITY VALUE IT IS MADE TO BE RARE, LIMITED IN QUANTITY AND THEREFORE ACCESSIBLE NOT TO THE MASSES BUT TO THE SOCIAL ELITE.

(MI COMENTARIO-MEJOR NO HACERLO, NO? Lo trágico es que muchos profesores de hoy en día en escuelas de Bellas Artes se han creído esta historia- O LO VES O NO TIENES CAPACIDAD INTELECTUAL, EN OTRAS PALABRAS- ERES TONTO-)


George Brecht, a core member of Fluxus, the loosely affiliated international group of playful Conceptual artists that emerged in the early 1960s, died on December 5 in Cologne at age eighty two, reports the New York Times’s Ken Johnson. He died in his sleep, said Geoffrey Hendricks, a friend, who was also a Fluxus member. He had been in failing health for several years.

Brecht came of age as an artist in the late 1950s, when Abstract Expressionism and the cult of the heroic creative genius were ascendant. Inspired by the Conceptual art of Marcel Duchamp and the experimental music of John Cage, he began to imagine a more modest, slyly provocative kind of art that would focus attention on the perceptual and cognitive experience of the viewer.

Like many other Fluxus artists, Brecht created assemblages consisting of ordinary objects in boxes and cabinets, as well as arrangements that often included chairs. He also made paintings and sculptures that played with language, like a piece with white plastic letters spelling SIGN OF THE TIMES.

Drip Music - George Brecht (Fluxus)

homage George Brecht





1926-2008
Born in New York in 1926, George Brecht was one of the most influential artists of the 1960s in New York, where he became involved with the experimental group of artists associated with Fluxus, including John Cage, Walter de Maria and George Maciunas. To his art, he brought a background in research chemistry, statistics and oriental philosophy, and he was also very much inspired by the Dadaist Tristan Tzara. He incorporated music, time and space in his work, often presenting simple, randomly arranged objects and calling on the viewer to bring their own experiences to the work, to interact with the object, to rearrange elements, or to do nothing. Some of Brecht's notable contributions to the Fluxus movement include Word Events and Fluxkits.