Venice in Venice, Curated by Jacqueline Miro and Tim Nye
Tells the History of L.A. Art Scene
Foundation 2021 has inaugurated Venice in Venice, an ambitious exhibition during La Biennale di Venezia, in celebration of Pacific Standard Time: Art in L.A. 1945-1980, an unprecedented collaboration of more than sixty cultural institutions across Southern California coming together for six months beginning in October 2011 to tell the story of the birth of the L.A. art scene and how it became a major new force in the art world. Each institution will make its own contribution to this grand-scale story of artistic innovation and social change, told through a multitude of simultaneous exhibitions and programs.
Curated by Jacqueline Miro and Tim Nye, Venice in Venice has been selected by la Biennale di Venezia as one of its collateral events where it will transport a group of revolutionary artists from the 1960s in Venice, California, to the city of Venice, Italy for the 54th International Art Exhibition. Los Angeles in the 1960s was thought to be the city of the modern world. Drawing inspiration from numerous sources, the sunlight, the reflective surface of the ocean, car and surfboard cultures, and the influx of new technologies introduced by the local engineering and aerospace industries and artists began experimenting with industrial materials in order to explore new possibilities for perception, light, and illusion. Their investigations were central to the developments of the still-nascent post-war Los Angeles art scene. Artists include Peter Alexander, John Altoon, Charles Arnoldi, Billy Al Bengston, Larry Bell, Tony Berlant, Wallace Berman, Vija Celmins, Bruce Conner, Ron Cooper, Mary Corse, Laddie John Dill, Joe Goode, Robert Graham, George Herms, Robert Irwin, Craig Kauffman, John McCracken, Ed Moses, Kenneth Price, Ed Ruscha, and James Turrell.
Linking the two cities of Venice is an inevitable concern with water, a shared unique luminosity (the product of intense sunlight refracted by droplets of mist and fog and light). Sun and Moon and Tides. Either/or, in Goethe’s word: "Venice(s), like everything else which has a phenomenal existence, is subject to Time…” to Light and Space…and Fetish. Once the event touches down in Venice, Italy, the art world will never be quite the same. As the drivers of Light and Space art embrace the edges of urban pop culture, surfers, skaters, and new technology buffs will gravitate to the heat of a single source of energy—the Biennale.
The artists will travel significant metaphoric waters from their roots squatting in an abandoned amusement park— which housed many of their studios as they first began their phenomenological experiments in the mid 1960s—to the opulent Palazzo Contarini dagli Scrigni on the Grand Canal. As the Academia Bridge unites the two banks of the Canal Grande, a fleet of psychedelic gondolas designed by Billy Al Bengston will unite Venice in Venice to Palazzo Grassi, creating a space time continuum of Venetian tradition with 1960s surf culture.
The curator Jacqueline Miro was born in San Salvador, El Salvador. After attending Middlesex Boarding School – with Venice in Venice co-curator and Nyehaus owner Tim Nye -- she obtained a Masters in architecture from Tulane University in New Orleans, Louisiana. In 1995, Miro moved to Paris where she got her Masters in urban policies at the Ecole Nationale des Ponds et Chaussees and joined Association Peripheriques. Upon returning to New York, she completed the Whitney Independent Studies Program and opened her design and architecture firm.
Miro and Daniela Fabricius started and continue to host the popular lecture series "Engaging the City" which focuses on urban issues around the world. Guests speakers have included Antony Vidler, Manuel de Landa, Vito Acconci, and many others. She joined Avroko in 2004, and has now joined forces with friend Tim Nye in recreating a brand for Nyehaus, editing books and catalogues, and most importantly, curating larger shows.
Venice in Venice will be unified by a revolutionary interactive program. Its goal is to not only offer an experience that allows the user to actively view, read and listen to content but to engage visitors and viewers to ignite their creative energies. A powerful arsenal of tools will be launched to excite the most reluctant of technophobes. Venice in Venice is not a re-creation, but an homage—an event that only the art, politics, and technical progress of the last 50 years can bring to life at a single event.
Swell Magazine, a new magazine published by the producers of Venice in Venice containing oral Histories by Tibby Rothman, essays by C.R. Stecyk, and all original art work by Jim Evans will be distributed.
Program
Venice—Glow & Reflection: June 1st through July 31st, 2011
Round Table Discussion: June 2nd
Billy Al Bengston Gondola Project: June 1st through July 31st
Skaters Project: June 4th at Campo San Polo
Venice in Venice Gala Concert: June 4th “Casanova vs. Philip Marlowe, P.I." at Campo San Polo
Venice in Venice
Palazzo Contarini Dagli Scrigni
Dorsoduro 1057/D
30123, Venezia
Reservations: gallery@nyehaus.com
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S25, Courtesy of Private Collection and Conseil & Acquisitions Art Contemporain
JOHN MCCRACKEN
Sangre
2001
Polyester resin and lacquer epoxy on fiberglass and plywood
27.95 x 15.55 x 10.04 in. (71 x 39.5 x 25.5 cm)
signed on underside: "SANGRE 2001" -
Courtesy of Paul Cornwall-Jones, Copyright of the Artist
GEORGE HERMS
Saturn Collage
1960
Mixed media
72 x 48 x 10 in. (182.9 x 121.9 x 25.4 cm) -
Courtesy of the Artist and NYEHAUS, NY
LADDIE JOHN DILL
Red Tide
1972
Sand, neon, argon with mercury
Dimensions variable, site specific -
Collection of the Orange County Museum of Art, Newport Beach, CA; Gift of Avco Financial Newport Beach, California
CRAIG KAUFFMAN
Untitled
1968
Vacuum-formed Plexiglas
22.5 x 52.25 x 13 inches (57.2 x 132.7 x 33 cm) -
Courtesy of the Estate of John Altoon and Braunstein/Quay Gallery, CA
JOHN ALTOON
F-14
1962-3
pastel and ink on illustration board
60 x 40 inches (152.4 x 101.6 cm) -
Photo: Cathy Carver, Courtesty of the Artist and NYEHAUS, NY
PETER ALEXANDER
Green Wedge
1969
cast polyester resin
14.5 x 9.5 x 8.75 inches (36.8 x 24.1 x 22.2 cm) -
Collection of the Orange County Museum of Art, Newport Beach, CA; Gift of Mr. and Mrs. John F Kelsey
ROBERT IRWIN
Untitled (#2220)
1969
cast acrylic and acrylic paint
54 x 54 x 24.5 in. (137.2 x 137.2 x 62.2 cm) -
Courtesy of NYEHAUS, NY
ROBERT GRAHAM
Untitled
1969
Mixed media sculpture in acrylic box
10.5 x 26 x 18.5 in. (26.7 x 66 x 47 cm)
