8,1 x 11,6 x 2 cm
The photograph Monologic – Yo-Yo 1, 2 (U. F. O.), (1982), shows Koller playing with a big white Yo-Yo in a drab concrete building among a group of tower blocks. For him, games like ping-pong or the yo-yo representsed the possibility of a more playful society in the face of socialist standardization. Koller’s semiological manipulations of landscape and topography, of places and (his own) faces, investigate the possibilities of shifting meaning by the simplest alterations. In deadpan-humorist fashion, most poignantly displayed in a series of photo-portraits that cover a period of more than four decades, he systematically explores the relationship between art and alienation, or the idea of art as alienation. “U. F. O.-naut J. K.” becomes the artist’s altered ego, an extraterrestrial maker and distributor of universal signs: question marks, Ping-Pong balls, or wave lines, a more recent signature symbol, formed by tennis balls in a swimming pool in 1992 or drawn on the floor in the “antiperformance” Nova vaznost’, 1991.” (Tom Holert, Artforum, October, 2004).
In its stringency, obsession and peculiarity, the oeuvre of Julius Koller is one of the most idiosyncratic and consistent in European art since the 1960s. Yet Koller is not only a seminal figure in the history of the neo- and post-avant-garde; his work has long been a critical inspiration for artists and intellectuals. In the most recent past, Koller’s concepts of the Anti-Happening, the Anti-Picture, the Universal-cultural Futurological Operation (U.F.O.), his actions, objects, texts and the enormous referential archive he built up, have attracted growing interest on the part of a broader art public. From around 1960, in response to the modernist mainstream in Slovak art, Julius Koller began to develop his aesthetic position of the “antihappening.” His strategy consists in using real objects and everyday life as the predefined program for an aesthetic operation: from 1965, in texts rubberstamped on paper that refer to the context of the “anti-happening,” and then in 1967/1968 in pictures for which Koller used white latex paint instead of oils and which saw the first appearance of the question mark—the symbol of Koller’s brands of naming, or “making known,” that was later to undergo many mutations in various media and states of aggregation. The “invitation cards for an idea”—as Koller called the text works relating to the “anti-happenings”—and the palimpsests and serial arrangements of the “anti-pictures” set themselves apart from the academicism of Modernism in more than just formal terms. Koller foregoes every form of technical mastery. The “anti-pictures” are amateurish in style, ensuring that they fulfill their task, defined by Koller as “engaging rather than arranging.” Julius Koller was born in 1939 in Piestany, Slovakia. He died in 2007 in Bratislava.
As the caption purposely admits, these drawings were made by friends of Ondák’s at home in Slovakia asked to interpret places he has journeyed to...
McCarthy’s Mother Pig performance at Shushi Gallery in 1983 was the first time he used a set, a practice which came to characterize his later works...
Untitled is a black-and-white photograph of a wave just before it breaks as seen from the distance of an overlook...
As the caption purposely admits, these drawings were made by friends of Ondák’s at home in Slovakia asked to interpret places he has journeyed to...
McCarthy’s Mother Pig performance at Shushi Gallery in 1983 was the first time he used a set, a practice which came to characterize his later works...
This series of photographs is inspired by the artist’s travels to Jos, Nigeria...
ALICEGAVINSERVICES™ — La MABA — Exposition — Slash Paris Connexion Newsletter Twitter Facebook ALICEGAVINSERVICES™ — La MABA — Exposition — Slash Paris Français English Accueil Événements Artistes Lieux Magazine Vidéos Retour ALICEGAVINSERVICES™ Exposition Design, graphisme, techniques mixtes Derniers Jours Alice Gavin, ALICEGAVINSERVICES™, sans titre Crédit photo : Léonard Méchineau ALICEGAVINSERVICES™ Encore 6 jours : 14 septembre → 17 décembre 2023 Cet automne, dans le cadre de sa saison dédiée au design graphique, la MABA présente, du 14 septembre au 17 décembre, une exposition consacrée à ALICEGAVINSERVICES™...
ArtsEquator: Looking Back, Turning Forward | ArtsEquator Skip to content As ArtsEquator enters its 7th year, we take stock and look forward to a fresh approach to supporting the arts in Southeast Asia in 2023 ArtsEquator celebrated its 6th Anniversary last month, and as is customary, we did a stock take...
Anti-Happening refers to Koller’s 1965 manifesto, ‘Anti-Happening (System of Subjective Objectivity)’...
In Monster (1996-97), the artist’s face becomes grotesque through the application of strips of transparent adhesive tape, typical of Gordon’s performance-based films that often depict his own body in action...
Shot in Oliveto Lucano, a village in the south of Italy, AUTOTROFIA (meaning self-eating) by artist Anton Vidokle is a cinéma vérité style film that slides fictive characters into real situations, and vice-versa, to draw a prolonged meditation on the cycle of life, seasonal renewal, and ecological awareness...
Kovanda’s ‘discreet’ actions (leaving a discussion in a rush, bumping into passers-by in the street, making a pile of rubbish and scattering it, looking at the sun until tears come…) are always documented according to the same format: a piece of A4 paper, a concise typewritten text, and sometimes a photograph taken by someone else...
Kovanda’s street interventions are always documented according to the same format as the actions: a piece of A4 paper, a typewritten text giving a precise location and date, and a photograph...
This Bay Area Filipino Streetwear Is a Favorite Among Rappers and Rebels | KQED Skip to Nav Skip to Main Skip to Footer Arts & Culture This Bay Area Filipino Streetwear Is a Favorite Among Rappers and Rebels Dario McCarty Dec 13 Save Article Save Article Failed to save article Please try again Facebook Share-FB Twitter Share-Twitter Email Share-Email Copy Link Copy Link Jaden Yo-Eco (left) and Humbert Lee pose for a portrait at Lee’s home in Daly City on Nov...
Resilient Currents: On Communal Re-Existence — Forma — Exhibition — Slash Paris Login Newsletter Twitter Facebook Resilient Currents: On Communal Re-Existence — Forma — Exhibition — Slash Paris English Français Home Events Artists Venues Magazine Videos Back Previous Next Resilient Currents: On Communal Re-Existence Exhibition Mixed media Upcoming Seba Calfuqueo, Miroir d’eau (capture d’écran), 2023 Courtesy de l’artiste Resilient Currents: On Communal Re-Existence In about 1 month: March 21 → April 25, 2024 In anticipation of La Collective, its future creation and solidarity center, Thanks for Nothing presents its first international exhibition, which focuses on socially engaged practices related to Central and South America...
Lisl Steiner, Photographer Who Glimpsed Luminaries Up Close, Dies at 95 - The New York Times Arts | Lisl Steiner, Photographer Who Glimpsed Luminaries Up Close, Dies at 95 https://www.nytimes.com/2023/06/18/arts/lisl-steiner-dead.html Give this article Share full article 5 Advertisement SKIP ADVERTISEMENT Lisl Steiner, a flamboyant photojournalist who was celebrated for her intimate, emotive images of history-tilting figures like Fidel Castro, John F...