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Andrew Zanoni

Michael Asher: An Exploration of Architecture Through Normality and its Influence on Artists to Come

Updated: Oct 27

Andrew M. Zanoni, IDSA

November 20, 2016


“Sculptures engagement with architecture has been particularly pronounced since the post-World War II era, with architecture serving as the often-ghosted upon ground which the polemics and practices of minimalism, Post Minimalism, Process art, land art, some conceptual art, some Performance art, institutional critique, installations art, and site-specific art all have come to defend.” - Miwon Kwon, 2009


Michael Asher’s exploration of normative viewing, perceptual situations and sensory engagement changed how people perceive art. Asher’s influence sparked revolutions across the artistic world affecting artists of different disciplines. Architecture can change the perspective on how art is viewed. Miwon Kwon believes the younger generation of artist’s absolute use of architecture and interior design elements is an effective use of space to produce and access the social cues of normal “everyday life.” The artist is able to demonstrate the differences and similarities between architecture and sculpture.[1] The design elements and relationships Kwon describes come in different forms ranging from direct and obvious relationships to purely verbal, to oppositional relationships. Miwon Kwon believes the conceptual artist Michael Asher produces work that references architecture’s forms and materials by creating similar forms and then assigning a new meaning to those elements.[2] The architecture usually comes in the form of spaces that engage the senses in uncommon ways, as well as critiques of objects inside a given space. The conceptual presentation of architecture and other elements is what Asher worked to instill onto his students while teaching at CalArts in the 70s. Silvia Kolbowski, a student of Asher’s said after graduating from CalArts and well into her own professional career that, “Conceptualism became a stimulating body of work to look back at, although always, of course, understood analogically from the point of view of the present, and always looked at critically-not because its failings were faults, but just because all work inevitably has historical shortcomings.”[3] When Kolbowski was interviewed the concept of conceptualism was no longer practiced because of the amount of criticism it received from people who did not understand it. However, Kolbowski still uses what she learned from Michael Asher in her own work despite being one of the critics of conceptualism that caused its downfall. “I think the way you approach conceptualism has something to do with our reception of it,”[4] said Stephen Prina, another one of Asher’s students whose work differs from Asher’s but the foundation inside all Prina’s work can be traced back to Asher.


            The majority of works by Michael Asher can be traced back to architectural roots. With that said, there are works that are obviously architecturally influenced while others are more cryptic like Asher’s George Washington. Asher’s relevancy to architecture is based off his work’s spatial relationships with the narrative of the space, and the location itself. Through this space Asher creates unspoken dialogue with the viewer by situational manipulations of the space and sculpture inside. Asher wants to connect art with people, like Duchamp, but with a strong relationship between art and architecture instead of sculpture.[5] One good example of this is Asher’s “air works”. The “air works” piece required Asher to install a single industrial fan or an array of fans inside a space to blow air in a variety of ways ranging from ceiling to floor to a conical pattern. The blowing air creates a feeling inside the body of being indoors while the viewer reflects what it is like to be in this space. Asher used an industrial Dayton air blower in the space and through association turns the blower into a work of art. The first “air works” installation was in his exhibition entitled, Appearing/DisappearingImage/Object in the Newport Harbor Museum and then repeated at the Whitney Museum but was titled, Anti-Illusion:Procedures/Materials. The volumes of moving air inside the museum interior enticed its viewers to interact with the space while making them reflect on art’s materiality and the separation of formalism in sculpture at galleries.[6] According to Orhan, “Air works ultimately stages the viewer through a highly configured sensorial theater in its situated “site” strategically selected in the gallery.”[7] Another work by Michael Asher was created with a lot of influence from architecture. In Santa Monica, Asher features the skeletal and ghostly forms of all the temporary walls that once populated the gallery space. The walls were installed in the exact place where they once stood, which sometimes meant walls overlapped each other. The walls were far apart and evoked a sense of clearing or expansion to the viewer. The spaces within the exhibition offered mental relief from the feelings of claustrophobia that the viewer experiences while walking through the exhibit. Depending on where the viewer stands or moves through the exhibition, a full spectrum of emotions would be experienced.[8] Kwon reflects on viewing the piece, “Depending on one’s position and movement, the installation and by extension the exhibition space as a whole appeared to shift from opaque, then to transparent, and then back again or the walls variously became solid masses, open volumes, and two dimensional planes, all as a function of the viewer’s mobile perspective.”[9] The unique presentation of the different layouts gives the viewer the ability to see the physicality and mechanics of prior exhibition displays and how they relate to time. Since the walls of Asher’s installation were merely demarcations of where the actual walls used to exist they were neither full pictorial planes or volumetric masses. The walls were unfinished to drive home the notion that the walls that once existed inside this exhibition were temporary and have long since been torn down. Asher uses these skeletal walls to communicate the importance of how we commonly perceive walls as being permanent and stable especially within the institutional context of the museum.[10] Michael Asher uses the exhibition to display architecture as well as the problems of sculpture related to architecture. Asher makes people think about structure and permanence of walls and what has previously happened in the spaces they are in such as a museum gallery.


         This next piece is one whose connection to architecture is much looser. The Duchampian paradigm for the readymade object viewed as a work of art suggests that the object is there to legitimize the function of the location where it is displayed. This is important because it helps to define the meaning of art. The object and location demonstrates the limitations of what qualities an object must possess whether physical or psychological to be considered art. The readymade has no meaning unless viewed within the context of an institution. Claude Gintz stated the readymade could be thought of as a “Conquest of Space”.[11] Asher’s George Washington work is a readymade which operates free of any introduction from an external reference. The base of the institution where it was displayed is a closed system which allowed Asher to shift symbolic elements that already resided inside the institution.[12] According to Gintz, Asher explains, “In this work I am interested in the way the sculpture functions when it is viewed in its eighteenth-century context instead of in its prior relationship to the façade of the building.”[13] When viewing this sculpture around works of art from the same time period one cannot help but to reflect about how the George Washington sculpture is related to everything else in the space, time period, and how people lived back then. Additionally, the George Washington sculpture is a critique of the institution because the sculpture used to be displayed outdoors at the museum’s front entrance. The George Washington sculpture looks out of place inside the museum, especially to those who visit often because they recognize the sculpture. Plus the sculpture is very weathered from being outside and from a quality standpoint is not on the same level as the rest of the pieces on display. One of the important things Asher’s George Washington did for art was to inspire a shift in thinking from displaying the piece as an autonomous object to one that is interwoven within the conditions of the institution it is displayed inside.[14] Asher’s clever use of architecture is both a critique of the institution and a method to engage his viewers physically and psychologically with their thoughts and physical senses.


         Asher has inspired many individuals for their own art through his art and teachings. One such student is Silvia Kolbowski, who was mentioned at the beginning of this paper and was inspired by Asher’s work at the Gallery Contemporaines.  Kolbowski created a similar work of her own that was displayed in the windows of the Harry Winston Inc. in New York. The piece was titled, an example of recent work may be seen in the windows of Harry Winston Inc., from approximately 5:17 pm to 5:34 pm, 1990. The art piece was the first of several similar works she did as a tribute to her professor, Michael Asher. All of these works reused Asher’s work from the 1960s. The Harry Winston Inc. store front for an invitation only jeweler consisted of four large display windows displaying jewelry that changed daily.  During the time frame stated in the title the viewers would get to see the guards close the gates of the store and replace the jewels with photographs. Kolbowski’s goal was to communicate the return of expansive craft production which was common in the late 1980s art.[15] Stephan Prina was also inspired by Asher’s work at the Gallery Contemporaines. He is the second artist mentioned earlier in the paper. Stephan Prina created, with the help of a translation agency in California, A translation from one language to another. The translation agency translated Prina’s work that was already written in German, English, and French into every language the agency offered. In a sense he created a compilation of a compilation. The final piece was translated into 61 languages. Most were typed while others which could not be typed were hand written. All of the pieces were on standard copy paper and framed. Prina’s work was displayed as a part of a larger installation called Forest of Signs: Art in the Crisis of Representation at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles. English, Spanish, and Japanese were the three most common languages spoken in that area of the museum and yet were left out. The space where the three languages belonged remained empty. Prina’s work received a lot of reaction from its viewers. He often got letters explaining how one of the translations was incorrect. Stephan Prina would always respond that he accepted any translations the agency provided and was more concerned with representation than accuracy or truth.[16] Another student of Asher’s in the 1970’s was Christopher Williams whose exhibit was also influenced by Asher. Williams showed his viewers architectural variations accompanied by short videos or performances next to photographs. At the Serravles museum in the early 1990s there was a long wooden ramp that attached the second floor galleries to the main floor. The wooden ramp’s architectural intent was to aid in movement between museum floors as well as to minimize the museum’s impact on the environment around it. The utilitarian and environmental relationship with the ramp, museum patrons, and the environment make the ramp both a reflection of the uneven terrain of the park around the museum and the architects respect for it. Williams felt the ramp directed the museum’s patrons away from the exhibition rooms on the immediate left and right of the ramp. To solve this, Williams chose to slightly alter the floor plan of the main exhibition floor by building a false wall in front of the mouth of the ramp in order to make it less visible and not pull attention away from the galleries on the main floor.[17] Lastly, a London based artist named Neal Rock decided that modern galleries in their current form are not the best way to display art. Rock believed “buildings can curate” which means the gallery space inside the museum should not be simple in order to push the focus of the viewers to the works of art inside. Instead, the gallery should be a work of art itself and enhance the art displayed inside. This architecture focused institutional critique makes the viewers rethink what a gallery space should be. Not unlike Asher’s installation at the Galleria Toselli where he power-washed all the paint and finishing off the floor, walls, and ceiling exposing the bare concrete with all its imperfections. Rock took another approach and decorated all of the neglected areas of the gallery both inside and outside of the museum with his own silicon splatter sculptures.[18] Michael Asher’s theories on institutional critique and architectural elements made an impression on these three artists to create their own work.


Michael Asher’s exploration of normative viewing, perceptual situations and sensory engagement influenced people from different generations and permanently changed how they experience art physically and psychologically. He truly was a revolutionary artist who contributed to society through his exhibitions and years of teaching at CalArts. Orhan Ayyuce believes, that whether it was architectural, conversational, sculptural, political or social, the context behind Asher’s work and his students work is sometimes more interesting than the actual object itself. Art is infinite and all around us, Asher takes advantage of this by hiding the real meaning of his work between the oscillation of the objectification and de-objectification of his exhibitions.[19] Michael Asher has successfully created art across all disciplines through architecture, sculpture, critique and physical spaces.

 

 

References


[1] KWON, MIWON. "Approaching Architecture: The Cases of Richard Serra and Michael Asher." Yale University Art Gallery Bulletin, 2009, 44. http://0-www.jstor.org.library.scad.edu/stable/40682627.

[2] KWON, MIWON. "Approaching Architecture: The Cases of Richard Serra and Michael Asher." Yale University Art Gallery Bulletin, 2009, 46. http://0-www.jstor.org.library.scad.edu/stable/40682627.

[3] Leung, Simon. "Contemporary Returns to Conceptual Art: Renée Green, Silvia Kolbowski, and Stephen Prina." Art Journal 60, no. 2 (2001): 58.

[4] Leung, Simon. "Contemporary Returns to Conceptual Art: Renée Green, Silvia Kolbowski, and Stephen Prina." Art Journal 60, no. 2 (2001): 64.

[5] Ayyuce, Orhan. "Michael Asher, 1943-2012." Archpaper.com. February 18, 2013. Accessed October 30, 2016. http://archpaper.com/2013/02/michael-asher-1943-2012/.

[6] Ayyuce, Orhan. "Michael Asher, 1943-2012." Archpaper.com. February 18, 2013. Accessed October 30, 2016. http://archpaper.com/2013/02/michael-asher-1943-2012/.

[7] Ayyuce, Orhan. "Michael Asher, 1943-2012." Archpaper.com. February 18, 2013. Accessed October 30, 2016. http://archpaper.com/2013/02/michael-asher-1943-2012/.

[8] KWON, MIWON. "Approaching Architecture: The Cases of Richard Serra and Michael Asher." Yale University Art Gallery Bulletin, 2009, 50. http://0-www.jstor.org.library.scad.edu/stable/40682627.

[9] KWON, MIWON. "Approaching Architecture: The Cases of Richard Serra and Michael Asher." Yale University Art Gallery Bulletin, 2009, 51. http://0-www.jstor.org.library.scad.edu/stable/40682627.

[10] KWON, MIWON. "Approaching Architecture: The Cases of Richard Serra and Michael Asher." Yale University Art Gallery Bulletin, 2009, 54. http://0-www.jstor.org.library.scad.edu/stable/40682627.

[11] Gintz, Claude, and Judith Aminoff. "Michael Asher and the Transformation of "Situational Aesthetics"” October 66 (September/October 1993): 113. Accessed October 17, 2016. doi:10.2307/778757.

[12] Gintz, Claude, and Judith Aminoff. "Michael Asher and the Transformation of "Situational Aesthetics"” October 66 (September/October 1993): 114. Accessed October 17, 2016. doi:10.2307/778757.

[13] King, Jennifer. "Perpetually out of Place: Michael Asher and Jean-Antoine Houdon at the Art Institute of Chicago." October 120 (Spring 2007): 71. Accessed October 17, 2016. http://0-www.jstor.org.library.scad.edu/stable/40368469.

[14] King, Jennifer. "Perpetually out of Place: Michael Asher and Jean-Antoine Houdon at the Art Institute of Chicago." October 120 (Spring 2007): 74. Accessed October 17, 2016. http://0-www.jstor.org.library.scad.edu/stable/40368469.

[15] Leung, Simon. "Contemporary Returns to Conceptual Art: Renée Green, Silvia Kolbowski, and Stephen Prina." Art Journal 60, no. 2 (2001): 59.

[16] Leung, Simon. "Contemporary Returns to Conceptual Art: Renée Green, Silvia Kolbowski, and Stephen Prina." Art Journal 60, no. 2 (2001): 61.

[17] Godfrey, Mark. "Cameras, Corn, Christopher Williams, and the Cold War." October 126 (2008): 132. http://0-www.jstor.org.library.scad.edu/stable/40368522.

[18] Basar, Shumon, Joshua Bolchover, and Parag Sharma. "Can Buildings Curate." Storefront for Art and Architecture. September 13, 2005. Accessed October 30, 2016. http://storefrontnews.org/archive/can-buildings-curate/support/support/.

[19] Ayyuce, Orhan. "Michael Asher, 1943-2012." Archpaper.com. February 18, 2013. Accessed October 30, 2016. http://archpaper.com/2013/02/michael-asher-1943-2012/.

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