Press


Monday, 26 September 2011 - Fluxhibition #4 (including A Book About Death and Fluxface in Space) was in the Critic's Top 5 Exhibitions in Forth Worth for 2011 from Fort Worth Weekly. (the show was in 2010 but they were including shows from the past 12 months) see fwweekly.com page

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 FROM THE FORT WORTH WEEKLY

Fort Worth in Fluxus

The late-20th-century style is ready for takeoff in Fort Worth.

 

 ORIGINAL PRESS RELEASE BELOW

The Ontological Museum
6955 Pinon Street Fort Worth Texas 76116
http://ontologicalmuseum.org
http://fluxmuseum.org

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE :

INTERNATIONAL FLUXHIBITION #4 – FLUXUS AMUSEMENTS, DIVERSIONS, GAMES TRICKS AND PUZZLES: Works from USA, Canada, UK, Ireland, Belgium, Norway, South Korea, Japan, China, Philippines, Uruguay, Colombia, Brazil, Italy, France, Greece, Australia, Portugal, Austria, Germany, Denmark, Ukraine, Hungary, Serbia.

OPENING: October 8, 2010 - 6 PM - 9 PM
EXHIBITION: October 8-30, 2010; Monday - Saturday, 10AM - 5PM
THE EXHIBITION ONLINE: http://fluxmuseum.org/fluxhibition-4/

FOR ALL INFORMATION, INTERVIEWS, IMAGES PLEASE CONTACT:
Cecil Touchon, Director,
The Ontological Museum:
Tel. 1 817 944 4000
Email : info@ontologicalmuseum.org

FORT WORTH, TEXAS – The FLUXMuseum is pleased to present its fourth international exhibition of recent acquisitions to the permanent collection entitled: INTERNATIONAL FLUXHIBITION #4 – FLUXUS AMUSEMENTS, DIVERSIONS, GAMES, TRICKS AND PUZZLES. The exhibition consists of more than 120 works of art from 23 countries on 5 continents.

Conceived and curated by Cecil Touchon, founding director of the Fluxmuseum, Fluxhibition #4 explores the playful, ephemeral, conceptual, performance based art of the contemporary Fluxus community. Artists created a variety of unique games, puzzles and other artworks inspired by games or amusements.

ABOUT FLUXUS

Fluxus is an expression of avant garde art that finds its place along the trajectory of Futurism, Dada, Surrealism, Situationalism, and Conceptual Art with roots in the work of Marcel Duchamp, Kurt Schwitters, Joseph Cornell, and John Cage . The contemporary fluxus community refers to this rich legacy in the works conceived for this show.  

Fluxus is an invented word that focuses on the various meanings of the word ‘flux’: to flow, to be fluid, to fuse together, to change. At times references are made jokingly to its meaning related to the discharge bodily fluids. The tradition of Fluxus began in 1961with the invention of the word by George Maciunas in New York City. Of Lithuanian decent, Maciunas had a socialist bent and was contemptuous of the High Art establishment and saw it as exclusive and elitist. Hoping to start a revolution, Maciunas saw himself as an outsider who could design an art strategy that democratized art production and return art to ‘the people’ by thinking about art as an activity that virtually anyone could participate in. Thus most fluxus works are intentionally amateurish, low budget and potentially intended for mass production and mass consumption.

Ironically, the Museum of Modern Art, recently acquired the massive Gilbert and Lila
Silverman Fluxus Collection considered by MoMA to be the largest collection of its kind comprised of approximately 3,000 works in mediums ranging from printed ephemera, multiples, drawings, and sculptural objects, to photographs and film. In addition, an archival component includes more than 4,000 files with such items as artists’ correspondence, notebooks and scrapbooks, as well as documents and photographs related to Fluxus performances and events. The final component of the Silverman Fluxus Collection is a reference library of over 1,500 related books and catalogues.
http://press.moma.org/images/press/PRESS_RELEASE_ARCHIVE/FluxusFinalRelease.pdf

FLUXUS ART

Fluxus art often deals with the ephemera and activity of everyday life to create works that subvert the intent of the materials or bend them to another purpose. This might include rendering utilitarian objects useless or creating alternate uses not originally intended in order to reinvent the world in unexpected ways. The use of chance is common.

Fluxus art can be utterly genius in its economy. Fluxus is credited with coming up with the event score which is akin to a musical score but is in the form of written instructions. These instructions can be brief and enigmatic and might even be a single word that suggests some sort of action, event or performance such as George Brecht’s EXIT. And even further, an event score can be reduced to a sign such as an arrow or a hand pointing. Fluxus artists enjoy exploring the powerful potentialities of everyday things and images by looking at them with the awakened and curious mind of the artist.

Fluxus works are very often larger than themselves in the sense that the works might be referencing something outside of their material existence. For instance, a work might actually be an artifact of some other art event or the work might be more of a prop for some performance or event. Fluxus artworks often play with that uncertain space between the expected and the unexpected which is where the secret of humor is found and humor is very often at the heart of many Fluxus works.

WORKS IN THE SHOW

Works in the present show – the largest of its kind ever assembled - have in common the general idea of play and joking around. Depending on the personality and skill level of the artist, some works are elaborate, some are cleaver; some are cheesy; some are ironic; some are beautiful; some are lude: taken as a whole, all are entertaining.

A color catalog will be produced for the exhibition and will be available to order when complete.

THE FLUXMUSEUM

The Fluxmuseum (fluxmuseum.org) is a wing of the Ontological Museum founded in 1994 (ontologicalmuseum.org).  FLUXmUSeum was founded by Cecil Touchon in 2006 with the intention of documenting 21st century fluxus artists. The Fluxmuseum is dedicated to the collection, performance, production, publishing, promotion, exhibition, documentation and safekeeping of works of the international contemporary Fluxus community. The Fluxmuseum is an inclusive venture inviting any artist who feels a connection to fluxus to participate in museum projects and to contribute works to the collection.

THE ONTOLOGICAL MUSEUM

The Ontological Museum has several wings including the Fluxmuseum, the International Museum of Collage, Assemblage and Construction, the Museum of Snapshot Photography and the Archives of the Eternal Network (for mail art). The Museum is fashioned along the lines of a scientific or anthropological museum in that it is a specimen gathering museum attempting to archive artworks and documents of contemporary artists from around the world whose work falls within the general interests of the museum. The museum is artist designed, artist run and artist supported. The collection is growing at an astounding rate and we are now looking for a permanent home for the museum and funds to operate, care for and exhibit the collection. Contact us if you have a space we can use or wish to contribute.

For more details,
http://fluxmuseum.org/
http://ontologicalmuseum.org (see all our projects)

FOR ALL INFORMATION, INTERVIEWS, IMAGES PLEASE CONTACT :
Cecil Touchon, Director, The Ontological Museum: 1 817 944 4000 E : info@ontologicalmuseum.org