Allan Kaprow

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Allan Kaprow (1973)

Allan Kaprow (born August 23, 1927 in Atlantic City , †  April 5, 2006 in Encinitas near San Diego ) was an American artist and art theorist of action art . The name " happening " goes back to him .

Life

Kaprow studied art, art history and composition. He was heavily influenced by the composer John Cage and sought to overcome the abstract expressionism of Jackson Pollock .

Space and gesture were at the center of his art. Together with George Maciunas , George Brecht and Al Hansen he organized the first happenings in New York (in the Reuben Gallery) and created environments . His art theoretical writings contain important theses on environment, happening and intermedia art .

plant

Kaprow is considered the father of happenings, an art term that he coined in New York in 1958. Happenings were hybrid forms of avant-garde performances - without recognizable dramaturgy and with collage-like, often simultaneously organized events, with blurred boundaries between performers and audience, appealing to the senses, open to chance and improvisation and the everyday circumstances surrounding them - in which the most varied of art media (painting , Music, dance, theater) were disguised as ordinary everyday objects (newspaper, noise, body movements, everyday activities) and put together to form theater-like events.

Since 1958, more than 250 Happenings and Activities by Allan Kaprow have been realized, among others by important institutions such as the Museum of Modern Art (New York), the Walker Art Center (Minneapolis), the MIT (Cambridge, MA), the Center Georges Pompidou (Paris ) and the documenta in Kassel.

In October 2006, the House of Art in Munich offered a retrospective of his works. Allan Kaprow's estate is represented by Hauser & Wirth Zurich London.

Happenings

1958

  • Communication Happening (New Brunswick / New Jersey)

1959

  • 18 happenings in 6 parts (New York)

1962

  • Chicken (Philadelphia)
  • The Courtyard (New York)

1964

  • Eat (New York)

1965

  • Calling (New York)
  • Soap (Sarasote / Florida)

1966

  • Gas (New York)
  • Self-Service (Boston, New York, Los Angeles, 1966)

1967

  • Fluids

1968

  • Travelog (New York)

1971

  • City Works (Bochum)

1972

  • BTU Basic Thermal Units (Bochum, Essen, Duisburg)

1976

  • Seven Kinds of Sympathy (Vienna)

1981

  • Happening of the false photos (Die Zeit, March 20, 1981)

2005

  • Fluids (Basel)

Environments

  • Penny Arcade (1956)
  • Untitled Environment (1958)
  • Yard (1961)
  • Words (1962)

Fonts

  • The Legacy of Jackson Pollock. In: Art News. Volume 57, October 1958.
  • Happenings in the New York Scene. In: Art News. May 1961.
  • Assemblage , Environments and Happenings. 1966.
  • Some Recent Happenings. (= A Great Bear Pamphlet. No. 7). New York 1966. (New edition: ubuclassics 2004 pdf 592k )
  • Untitled Essays and Other Works. (= A Great Bear Pamphlet. [No. 16]). New York 1967. (New edition: ubuclassics pdf 796k )
  • The Shape of the Art Environment. In: ArtForum. vol. 6, no. 10, 1968, pp. 32-33.
  • The Education of the Un-Artist, Part I. In: Art News. February 1971.
  • The Education of the Un-Artist, Part II. In: Art News. May 1972.
  • The Education of the Un-Artist, Part III. In: Art in America. January 1974.
  • Essays on the Blurring of Art and Life. University of California Press, Berkeley 1993, ISBN 0-520-07066-6 .
  • Fluids. König, Cologne 2005, ISBN 3-88375-996-1 .

literature

  • Jürgen Claus: The happening. In: Art Today. People. Analyzes. Documents. Rowohlt's German encyclopedia, Reinbek / Hamburg 1965, pp. 208 ff.
  • Jeff Kelley (Ed.): Essays on the Blurring of Art and Life. University of California Press, Berkeley 1993, ISBN 0-520-20562-6 .
  • Philip origin: Household - Allan Kaprow's economy. P. 6–18, In: Parkett. No. 62, Parkett-Verlag, Zurich et al. 2001. ISSN  0256-0917
  • Philip Ursprung: Limits of Art. Allan Kaprow and the Happening, Robert Smithson and the Land Art. Schreiber, Munich 2003, ISBN 3-88960-046-8 .
  • Jeff Kelley: Childsplay. The Art of Allan Kaprow. University of California Press, Berkeley 2004, ISBN 0-520-23671-8 .
  • Thomas Dreher: Performance Art after 1945. Action theater and intermedia. Munich 2001, ISBN 3-7705-3452-2 , pp. 65f., 85-102, 139ff., 250-254, 366f. (Notes contain bibliographical information on individual happenings).
  • SD Sauerbier: object, environment, event. Aesthetic activities. [About the work of Allan Kaprow.] (= Artist. Critical Lexicon of Contemporary Art. Issue 34). Volume 5, Munich 1995.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Petra Kipphoff: The happening man. In: The time. 35/1987, online version
personal data
SURNAME Kaprow, Allan
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American artist and art theorist of action art, coined the term "happening"
DATE OF BIRTH August 23, 1927
PLACE OF BIRTH Atlantic City , USA
DATE OF DEATH April 5, 2006
Place of death Encinitas near San Diego