Art & Language

The name Art & Language is derived from the journal Art-Language (first published in Coventry in May 1969) which had its origins in the work of Terry Atkinson and Michael Baldwin (from 1966) in association with Harold Hurrell and David Bainbridge. These were its original editors. Art & Language was used subsequently to identify the joint and several artistic works of these four in an effort to reflect the conversational basis of their activity which, by late 1969, already included contributions from New York by Joseph Kosuth, Ian Burn and Mel Ramsden.

The facts of who did what, how much they contributed and so on, are more or less well known. The (small) degree of anonymity which the name originally conferred continues, however, to be of historical significance.

The first issue of Art-Language (Volume 1 Number 1, May 1969) is subtitled ‘The Journal of Conceptual Art’. By the second issue (Volume 1 Number 2, February 1970) it had become clear that there was some Conceptual Art and more Conceptual artists for whom and to whom the journal did not speak. The inscription was accordingly abandoned. Art-Language had, however, laid claim to a purpose and to a constituency. It was the first imprint to identify a public entity called ‘Conceptual Art’ and the first to serve the theoretical and conversational interests of a community of artists and critics who were its producers and users. While that community was far from unanimous as to the nature of Conceptual Art, the views of the editors and most of the early contributors shared a powerful family resemblance: Conceptual Art was critical of Modernism for its bureaucracy and its historicism and of Minimalism for its philosophical conservatism; the practice of Conceptual Art was primarily theory and its form preponderantly textual.

As the distribution of the journal and the teaching practice of the editors and others developed, the conversation expanded and multiplied to include by 1971 (in England) Charles Harrison, Philip Pilkington, David Rushton, Lynn Lemaster, Sandra Harrison, Graham Howard, Paul Wood, and (in New York) Michael Corris, and later Paula Ramsden, Mayo Thompson, Christine Kozlov, Preston Heller, Andrew Menard and Kathryn Bigelow.

The name Art & Language sat precariously over all this. Its significance (or instrumentality) varied from person to person, alliance to alliance, (sub)discourse to (sub)discourse – from those in New York who produced The Fox (1974-76) to those engaged in music projects or to those who continued the original journal. There was confusion and by 1976 a dialectically fruitful confusion had become a chaos of competing individualities and concerns.

Decisive action had become necessary if any vestige of Art & Language’s original ethos was to remain. There were those who saw themselves excluded from this who departed for individual occupations in teaching or as artists. There were others immune to the troubles who simply found different work. Terry Atkinson had departed in 1974. There were yet others whose departure was expedited by those whose practice had continued (and continues) to be identified with the journal Art-Language and its artistic commitments. While musical activities continued and continue with Mayo Thompson and The Red Crayola, and the literary conversational project continued with Charles Harrison(1942-2009), by late 1976 the genealogical thread of this artistic work had been taken into the hands of Michael Baldwin and Mel Ramsden, with whom it remains.

The journal Art-Language has been published since 1969.

Select Solo exhibitions:

‘Vat ‘68’, The Herbert Art Gallery, Coventry, 1968 Daniel Templon, Paris, 1970 Galleria Sperone, Turin, 1971 Paul Maenz, Cologne, 1973 John Weber Gallery, New York, 1973 Lisson Gallery, London, 1973 Galerie Bischofberger, Zurich, 1974 Galleria Schema, Florence, 1975 Galerie Eric Fabre, Paris, 1976 Galleria Lia Rumma,Rome, 1977 Van Abbemuseum, Eindhoven, 1980 Gewad, Ghent, 1983 Galerie Grita Insam, Vienna, 1983 Tate Gallery, London, 1985 Palais des Beaux-Arts, Brussels, 1987 Marian Goodman Gallery, New York, 1987 Galerie Nationale du Jeu de Paume, Paris, 1992 Galeria Juana de Aizpuru, Madrid, 1995 Galerie Grita Insam, Vienna, 1999 Fundació Antoni Tapies, Barcelona, 1999 PS1/Contemporary Art Center, New York, 1999 ‘Art & Language & Luhmann No.2’ ZKM, Karlsruhe, 1999 ‘Too Dark to Read: Motifs Rétrospectifs’ , Musée d’art moderne Villeneuve d’ascq, 2002 ‘Art & Language’, Migrosmuseum fur gegenwartskunst, Zurich, November, 2003 Galeria Filomena Soares, Lisbon, March-May, 2004 ‘Art & Language’ CAC Málaga, September-October, 2004 ‘Hard to Say When’, Lisson Gallery, London, May-July, 2005 ‘Now They Are Surrounded’, November 2005, Zentrum fur Kunst und Medientechnologie, Karlsruhe. Exhibition to accompany the symposium ‘Art & Language and Luhmann III’, 5th-6th November ‘Art & Language’, Galerie Grita Insam, Vienna, December-January, 2006 ‘Il ne reste qu’à chanter’, Galerie de l’Erban, Nantes (Miroirs 1965, Karaoke 1975-2005) and Chateau de la Bainerie (Travaux 1965-2005), March-April 'Art & Language', EMMA, Finland, October 2009-January 2010

Select Group exhibitions

‘Language II’, Dwan Gallery, New York, 1968 ‘Information’, Museum of Modern Art, New York, 1970 ‘The British Avant-Garde’, New York Cultural Center, New York, 1971 ‘Documenta 5’, Kassel, 1972 ‘Biennale di Venezia’, 1976 ‘Kunst in Europa na ‘68’, Museum Van Hedendaagse Kunst, Ghent, 1980 ‘Documenta 7’, Kassel, 1982 ‘British Art of the 20th Century’, Royal Academy, London, 1987 ‘The Situationist International, 1957-1972’ Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris, 1989 ‘L’art conceptual, une perspective’, Musée d’art Moderne de la Ville de Paris, 1989 ‘Repeticion/Transformacion’, Reina Sofia, Madrid, 1992 ‘Reconsidering the Object of Art 1965-1972’, Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, 1995 ‘Documenta X’, Kassel, 1997 ‘L’envers du décor,Dimensions décoratives dans l’art du xxe Siècle’, Musée du Art Moderne, Villeneuve D’Ascq, 1998 ‘Museum as Muse; Artists Reflect’, Museum of Modern Art, New York, 1999 ‘Global Conceptualism; Points of Origin 1950s-1980s’, Queens Museum of Art, New York, 1999 ‘Live in Your Head: Concept and Experiment in Britain 1965-75’, Whitechaple Gallery, London, 2000. ‘Many coloured Objects placed side by side to form a Row of Many Coloured Objects’, works from the collection of Annick and Anton Herbert, Casino Luxembourg, 2000 ‘Iconoclash’, Center for Art and Media (ZKM) Karlsruhe, 2002 ‘Blast to Freeze: Britische Kunst im 20.Jahrhunert’, Kunstmuseum, Wolfsburg, 2002 Venice Biennale (‘Individual Systems’ curated by Igor Zabel) ‘Wittgenstein Family Likenesses’, Institute of Visual Culture/Wittgenstein Archives, Cambridge, October-November, 2003 ‘Adorno’, Frankfurter Kunstverein, October-January, 2003 ‘Before the End (The Last Painting Show)’ curated by Olivier Mosset, Swiss Institute, New York, September , 2004 ‘Cram Sessions:03 Sound Politics’, Baltimore Museum of Art, April-May, 2005 ‘Collective Creativity’, Kunsthalle Fridericianum, Kassel, April-May, 2005 ‘50 years of Documenta 1955-2005’ Kunsthalle Fridericianum, Kassel, September-November, 2005 ‘Public Space/Two Audiences: Works and Documents from the Herbert Collection, Musee d’Art Contemporani de Barcelona, 2006 ‘Dark Matter’, White Cube, London, July-September, 2006

Select books by or about Art & Language

Art & Language: Texte zum Phanomen Kunst und Sprache, Select essays by Art & Language (German English edition), Verlag Dumont-Schauberg,Cologne, 1972 Art & Language 1975-1978 (selected essays by Art & Language), Eric Fabre, Paris (French English edition), 1978 Art & Language, Selected essays 1966-80, Stedelijk Van Abbemuseum, Eindhoven, 1980 Charles Harrison, Essays on Art & Language, Blackwell, Oxford, 1988 Art & Language and Luhmann, Institut fur soziale Gegenwartsfragen, Freiburg, and Kunstraum, Vienna, eds., Passagen Verlag, Vienna. Texts by Art & Language,Paul Wood, Charles Harrison, Thomas Dreher, Niklaus Luhmann, Catherine David, Peter Weibel. Anne Rorimer, New Art in the 60s and 70s; Redefining Reality, Thames and Hudson. Charles Harrison, Conceptual Art and Painting; Further Essays on Art & Language,MIT Press, Cambridge Massachusetts and London, England Peter Osborne, Conceptual Art, Phaidon Books, London Michael Corris, Conceptual Art, Cambridge University Press, 2004

Select exhibition catalogues

Art & Language, The Paintings, Palais des Beaux-Arts, Brussels, 1987 Hostages, Lisson Gallery, London, Galerie de Paris, Marian Goodman Gallery, New York, 1988 Art & Language, Galerie Nationale du Jeu de Paume, Paris, 1992 Art & Language in Practice, Volume 1, Illustrated Handbook, Volume 2, Critical Symposium, Fundació Antoni Tapies, Barcelona, 1999 Art & Language: Too Dark to Read, Motifs Retrospectifs 2002-1965, Musee d’art moderne de Lille Metropole, Villeneuve d’ascq, 2002 Art & Language, Homes from Homes II, Migrosmuseum fur Gegenwartskunst/JRP Ringier, Zurich, 2006

Select records and CDs

(Art & Language have produced recorded music with The Red Crayola.) Corrected Slogans, 1976. (Drag City/Dexter’s Cigar, Chicago, 1997 Kangaroo?, 1981, (Drag City/Dexter’s Cigar, Chicago, 1995

External links

• Works by Art & Language at the Mulier Mulier Gallery
• Works by Art & Language at the Lisson Gallery
• Art & Language: Blurting in A & L online Hypertext version of a complete print work of 1973 by American members of Art & Language, with articles and a discussion forum.
• Thomas Dreher: Intermedia Art: Konzeptuelle Kunst with three German articles on Art & Language and a chronology with illustrated works.
• Artists group page in Artfacts.Net with actual major exhibitions.
• Andrew Hunt, Art & Language, Frieze, October 2005.
• Tom Morton, Art & Language, Frieze, April 2002.