“Installation view of Bruce Nauman’s Days, ICA. Photographer: Stephen White. Courtesy of ICA”
19th June – 16th September 2012
The ICA is to present the UK premiere of Bruce Nauman’s ‘Days’, a sound installation consisting of a continuous stream of seven voices reciting the days of the week in random order. Fourteen flat panel speakers will be installed with one voice emanating from each pair of speakers as the visitor passes between them. The work invokes both the banality and the profundity of the passing of each day and invites reflection on how we measure, differentiate and commemorate time.
Nauman’s work constantly tests rational systems of language, spatial and bodily encounters, duration and psychology through constructed environments. His pioneering work spans over five decades and encompasses a wide spectrum of media including sculpture, drawing, site- specific installation, sound pieces, neon, photography, film, video, performance and text/language.
Bruce Nauman is one of the most influential artists of our time and we’re delighted to welcome the seminal work ‘Days’ to the UK. Nauman’s work was first seen in Britain at the ICA in 1969 as part of the group exhibition “When Attitude Becomes Form”, organised by Harald Szeeman. It is therefore a great pleasure to bring Nauman’s art back into the building. Working with multimedia and sound since the mid-1960s, Nauman’s continued influence on emerging artists is undeniable and I hope that SOUNDWORKS will celebrate his ongoing inspiration
. – Gregor Muir, Executive Director ICA
SOUNDWORKS: 20th June – 16th September 2012
In conjunction with the exhibition of Nauman?s Days, the ICA presents a series of sound submissions from over a hundred international artists. Selected by the ICA and institutions worldwide, the artists have been invited to submit a sound work taking its stimulus from the themes evoked in Nauman?s Days. SOUNDWORKS aims to take a broader look at the range of work being produced in audio arts today.
From acoustic environments to audio fiction, commentary, found sounds, field recordings, minimal composition, and experiments in music, the medium of sound is attractive to artists coming from a wide array of practices. SOUNDWORKS aims to show this diversity and embrace the ephemeral and peripatetic nature of sound through the creation of an online platform that doubles as a virtual exhibition space.
The online presentation of the project makes the sound works internationally accessible, providing a place to explore sound as a medium which is simultaneously inclusive, interactive, and subversive. The exhibition includes a wide range of audible approaches by artists who have been working with the medium for many years, as well as artists taking their first venture into sonic arts. Parallel to the online presentation, the project will also be accessible in the ICA galleries.
The genre of sound itself is not a new phenomenon but goes back to the early 20th century to the experiments by artist movements such as the Dadaist and Futurist groups led by protagonists like Kurt Schwitters and Luigi Russolo, and composers such as Eric Satie, Arthur Honegger, and later artists such as John Cage, La Monte Young and Steve Reich.
However, with the readily available technology of sound recording equipment, specialized training is no longer required in order to work with audio. Sound has become an artistic tool openly accessible to artists in the same way as photography, filming, drawing, and other media.
Nauman?s Days and SOUNDWORKS will be accompanied by an events programme comprised of talks, screenings, and performances. Former Add N to (X) band member Steven Claydon, Scottish artist Ruth Ewan and Venice Biennale Silver Lion recipient Haroon Mirza will discuss the labelling of „Sound Art? in The Trouble with Sound Art on 4 July. Audio Arts founder William Furlong will talk about the audio cassette-magazine Audio Arts, the world?s most comprehensive sound archive of artists? voices and sound art on 5 September. Gavin Bryars will discuss his work in relation to the development of sound arts on 11 September. The forthcoming editions of the Artists Film Club will focus on sound-related works during this period. The sound season will culminate in a weekend, 14 – 15 September, exploring the sound contributions that were produced as part of SOUNDWORKS.
In addition Luke Fowler, ICA Artist in Residence and Turner Prize nominee, will be contributing to the SOUNDWORKS project, and producing a piece in response to the ICA Archive.
For more info and to get involved: www.ica.org.uk/soundworks
Partners for the show BMW, Sedition and Wallpaper as well as the support of PRS for Music Foundation, Jawbone and the Arts Council England.
www.facebook.com/icalondon
www.ica.org.uk
To accompany SOUNDWORKS the ICA will publish new Limited Edition prints by Richard Aldrich
and Oscar Murillo. More information can be found here: www.ica.org.uk/editions
About Bruce Nauman
Bruce Nauman (b. 1941, Fort Wayne, Indiana, USA) studied mathematics, physics and fine art at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, and then pursued an MFA at the University of California, Davis. There artists such as Wayne Thiebaud and William T. Wiley supported his experimental attitude toward art making.
Nauman’s first solo exhibition took place in 1966 at the Nicholas Wilder Gallery in Los Angeles and his work also featured in Lucy R. Lippard’s Eccentric Abstraction group exhibition at the Fischbach Gallery in New York. Nauman’s solo debut in New York at Leo Castelli Gallery in 1968 was soon followed by a one-man exhibition at Konrad Fischer’s gallery in Düsseldorf. In 1973, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art and the Whitney Museum of American Art co-organized the first museum survey, Bruce Nauman: Works from 1965-1972, an exhibition that also travelled in Europe. Nauman’s work was included in the group exhibition “When Attitude Becomes Form” at the ICA, organised by Harald Szeeman in 1969. The ICA later organised a solo exhibition entitled “Bruce Nauman: Use Me” in 1991.
Nauman’s work can be found in prominent museum collections throughout the world, and he has been the subject of many major solo exhibitions. Nauman has garnered multiple awards throughout his career including the Wexner Prize in 1994, the Leone d’oro (The Golden Lion) along with Louise Bourgeois at the 48th Venice Biennale in 1999, the Praemium Imperiale for Visual Arts in 2004 in Japan and the Golden Lion for Best National Participation at the 53rd Venice Biennale in 2009. Since 1975, Nauman has been represented in New York by Sperone Westwater. From 1979 Nauman has lived in New Mexico.
Bruce Nauman’s ‘Days’ was previously shown as part of Bruce Nauman: Topological Gardens at the 53rd Venice Biennale, organised by the Philadelphia Museum of Art, and at The Museum of Modern Art New York. ‘Days’ is presented at the ICA on loan from Emanuel Hoffmann Foundation, gift of the President, on permanent loan to Öffentliche Kunstsammlung Basel, and The Museum of Modern Art, New York, Committee on Painting and Sculpture Funds, gift of The Mimi and Peter Haas Fund, Agnes Gund, The Hess Foundation, Michael Ovitz, Jerry I. Speyer, Marie-Josée and Henry R. Kravis Foundation,Donald B. Marron, and The Jill and Peter Kraus Contemporary Acquisition Fund.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bruce_Nauman
