Venice: Fondazione Prada – Some Little Fluxus Events, Fluxus Concerts and Dinner. As part of the exhibition, The Small Utopia. Ars Multiplicata, curated by Germano Celant the Fondazione Prada organized a series of little Fluxus events to mark the fiftieth anniversary of the birth of Fluxus (1962-2012). Fluxus is the smallest of the small utopias of the 20th century, but also the one with the most illustrious founding fathers, from Erik Satie to Marcel Duchamp, Tristan Tzara, Filippo Tommaso Marinetti and John Cage. It has been and still is an avant-garde of the deracine artists from every corner of the world, specialists in contradiction, but faithful to a poetics that wants to turn art into an experience that measures up to the desires of life today, since, as Duchamp argued, le spectateur fait l’oeuvre.
Above: An installation of a Flux Shop from the exhibition, The Small Utopia. Ars Multiplicata at the Fondazione Prada, until November 25th.
Fluxus Event. To
commemorate this small and last utopia of the 20th century the
Fondazione Prada has asked Gianni-Emilio Simonetti, one of the Italian artists
who has played a part in Fluxus and who has been involved with music since
1960, to re-stage, in a manner as much in keeping with the spirit of the time as
possible, a Fluxus Concert, divided into two parts, and a Flux Dinner.
Above. Gianni-Emilio
Simonetti and part of his team of non professional performers.
Dealer Massimo Minini and Maestro Enrico Castellani
Co-founder of Design Drift Lonneke Gordijn and artist Lawrence Carroll
Fondazione Prada: The Small Utopia. Ars Multiplicata. A collection of original Fluxus memorabilia
cards.
Fluxus cards with famous quotes written on them were thrown from the
balcony as part of the performance.
Artist Gunther Uecker
Contemporary art curators Sarah Gold and Karlyn De Jongh and Fluxus author and historian Jon Hendricks
Artist and jewelry designer Lilli Doriguzzi wearing her silver brooch C.G.,
which stands for Canal Grande and features the seven gondola “traghetti’
crossings on the Gran Canal.
Fondazione Prada: The Small Utopia. Ars Multiplicata - A Flux Kit case. The
Term Fluxus was coined in 1961 in NY by George Maciunas (1931-78), but came
into current use the year after, in 1962, at Wiesbaden in Germany, where a
series of musical actions and events were held that have gone down in the
history of modern art and in particular of performance. Maciunas produced
affordable and portable publications and multiples meant to introduce
revolutionary art into everyday experience and to spread Fluxus ideas on an
international scale. Often housed in
small boxes or kits, the works also incorporated photography, performance scores,
films, found objects and especially event programs and newsletters reflecting
an interdisciplinary and conceptual approach.
Crime novelist Donna Leon
Events organizer Cristiano Seganfreddo and blogger Diane Pernet
Fluxus Event. Performers walked into the atrium of Ca Corner della Regina sat
in a circle and cleaned their violins with wood polish.
Dagospia's Roberto D'Agostino Italian journalist and TV personality
Designers Umberto Branchini and Servane Giol
Italian actresses Susy Laude and Ana Caterina Morariu
Fondazione Prada: The Small Utopia. Ars Multiplicata. Fluxus posters.
Art critic and director of the Visual Arts course at the IUAV University Angela Vettese
The Daughters: Gemma Richards and Amina Gandolfi
The Mothers: Pina Gandolfi and Francesca Ballini Richards
Fluxus Event. A Fluxus performer and her violin
gets tied up with string and then is set free…
Rolling Stone magazine's editor in chief Michele Lupi
Art and design collector Camilla Nesbitt, artist Paola Fiorido and Design Drift's co-founder Ralph Nauta
Space 4 Architect’s Guelfo Carpegna and jewelry designer Antonia Miletto
Turkish designer Neslihan isik
Fondazione Prada: The Small Utopia. Ars
Multiplicata. A poster advertising Fluxus Concerts in New York.
Fluxus Concerts. As part of Some Little Fluxus Events curated by
Gianni-Emilio Simonetti
two Fluxus Concerts took place at the Fondazione
Prada. An Anthology, Part I and Part II with pieces by Ay-o, George Brecht,
Philip Corner, Al Hansen, Dick Higgins, Alison Knowles, Takehisa Kosugi,
Shigeko Kubota, Joe Jones, George Maciunas, Walter Marchetti, Nam June Paik,
Ben Patterson, Terry Riley, Tomas Schmit, Mieko Shiomi, Ben Vautier, Robert
Watts and La Monte Young, and for the occasion several works by John Cage were reinterpreted
in the spirit of this avant-garde: Fontana Mix (1958), Sounds of Venice and
Water Walk (1959), Variation III (1962).
Fondazione Prada: The Fluxus Dinner. The Fluxus Dinner was preceded by John Cage’s Variation III (1962). Arthur C. Danto, the doyen of philosophy of
art in the United States, wrote in Unnatural Wonders (2005) that what
distinguished Fluxus in the 1970s was the use of food as art and as the subject
of many performances.
Above.
Gianni-Emilio Simonetti fries mushrooms, as per John Cage’s Variations
III (1962).
Fluxus Dinner. The top floor of Ca Corner della Regina
was transformed into a dinning room.
Fluxus Dinner – The Menu. On the Menu, John Cage, Variations III, 1962
was served as the Hors d’Oeuvre. Mystery
Flux-food was placed in cans on the table with can-openers. Also served Hard-Boiled
Eggs with Cream and Flowers of Borage, Prague Ham Sleeping on Hay Bed and Flowers of Calendula, Sorbet Drugs Colonial
and Flux-Degtine.
Fondazione Prada's Astrid Welter
Fluxus Dinner – The food. The food in cans sitting on the tables was ready to be eaten.
The Fluxus Dinner. Actor Frank O’Halloran read Fluxus phrases
during dinner.
Fluxus Dinner.
Eggshells and empty cans lay on the floor on a map of the Virgin
Islands.
Warm Fluxus bread was brought to the table.
