minimalism, means, minh-ha

thought some Benglis vs. Morris was in order! Just in case you haven't seen these in awhile!

So, apparently I have all the readings out of order, and now am basically just going at them at random...

Minimalism and Biography- Anna C. Chave, Art Bulletin, March 2000. (we made it to this century!)

Critical Reflections- Trinh T. Minh-ha, Art forum, Summer 1990.

The means of Correct Training, from Discipline and Punish, the birth of the prison by Michel Foucault, 1975.

Minimalism and biography- which could have been titled "Who slept with Morris? And their general effects on minimalism as a result, with tangential discussions of Eva Hesse and Carl Andre." I'm not making this up! You get to the end of the article, and the description of the author is as follows "Chave has authored studies...and numerous articles concerned with how modern and abstract art...may be sexually and ideologically inscribed." Actually, the insight that minimalist sculptures are really just set pieces for performance art is worth the whole article.

I had the great experience a couple of years ago of going to the Judd retrospective at the Tate Modern late night. The guards encouraged us (there were very few of us there) to view each other in relation to the minimalist pieces at hand. To look through the metal tubes and around the wall projections. As a result I always want to get right up to minimalist works, which are now protected by lasers in just about every gallery. Boo hiss!

Side Note- on our recent road trip my mom and I created a new game "Public Art? or Building Debris?" It's great, you should try it some time.

Ok, onto Minh-ha- Really enjoyed this piece, possibly because it's only 2 pages (?). It's another article about just how far we've come- yeah, I know white men still rule the world, but I don't know anyone who can get away with not engaging with the African-American woman experience now. Do we have a great big thank you to say to Oprah? It's tough for me to imagine anyone being overt enough to say that any experience isn't valid. Ain't life grand?

And then there's Foucault. What an odd reading- Why are we reading about the history of prisons, exactly? Are galleries prisons? I now have a crush on the word "reduplicate." Anyway, this one is dense and, well, not my cup of tea. But thanks to having a friend in the car willing to joke about penile colonies, I've now muddled through. And may you all!

ok, off to enjoy the Seattle nightlife. Believe I'm now attending a benefit for a bike shop...