ART-PRESENTATION: Gordon Matta-Clark-Anarchitect
Gordon Matta-Clark is widely considered one of the most influential artists working in the ‘70s. He was a key contributor to the activity and growth of the New York art world in SoHo from the late ‘60s until his untimely death in 1978. His practice introduced new and radical modes of physically exploring and subverting urban architecture.
By Efi Michalarou
Photo: The Bronx Museum of the Arts Archive
Soon after completing his studies at Cornell University School of Architecture (1962-68), Gordon Matta-Clark moved to New York and started developing a series of artworks in situ that seemed to perform an anatomy of sorts onto the very body of the urban landscape by literally cutting structures apart and exhibiting the remnants as demonstration. An important part of these actions were realized in the South Bronx during a period marked by the borough’s steep economic decline prompted in great part by massive exodus of its middle class to suburbia. As a consequence, a great number of abandoned buildings in the area provided raw material for Matta-Clark to intervene on. The exhibition “Gordon Matta-Clark: Anarchitect” at Bronx Museum of the Arts, includes 100 artworks by the artist, rarely seen materials from his archive, and immersive film projections, exploring the importance of Matta-Clark’s practice towards a rethinking of architecture after modernism. For the exhibition five of his films, originally shot with Super 8 are on presentation: “Fire Child” (1971) that shows him building “Garbage Wall” under the Brooklyn Bridge, while in “Substrait (Underground Dailies)” (1976), he leads viewers through tunnels and other underground spaces in the city. “Day’s End” (1975), documents one of his best-known series of “cuts,” which he made in a decrepit warehouse in the Meatpacking District on Pier 52. Matta-Clark photographed or filmed almost every one of his urban explorations. In the Bronx, it was the graffiti that captured his attention. He shot dozens of black-and-white photos of tagged walls and subway cars, often hand-coloring the graffiti with spray dye and assembling the prints into long scrolls to mimic the surfaces of train cars. The museum is devoting a whole gallery to the photos. One of the most iconic series from this period, “Bronx Cuts”, became emblematic of Matta-Clark’s practice and was later expanded onto highly ambitious works such as “Conical Intersect” (Paris, 1975), and “Office Baroque” (Antwerp, 1977). In addition to undermining the vocabulary of modulation and repetition that characterized modernist architecture, Matta-Clark also recognized the growing tendency toward public interaction exemplified by the proliferation of graffiti. Despite its ancient roots in history, graffiti had become a worldwide phenomenon since the postwar particularly among impoverished post-industrial communities. Countering the bleakness of urban sprawl, graffiti became a means of expression for youth everywhere to rebel against conformity and ultimately the authority of the architect. Ironically, Matta-Clark’s cut-up method, borne out of the rubble of industrial era landscape, would later become extremely influential among younger architects, particularly those associated with deconstruction theory, such as Frank Gehry, Peter Eisenman and Daniel Libeskind. More recently, with the reevaluation of urban culture, Matta-Clark’s works on graffiti have also proved prescient in pointing to new directions to architecture as a growing number of designer are looking at graffiti for inspiration.
Info: Curators: Sergio Bessa and Jessamyn Fiori, The Bronx Museum of the Arts, 1040 Grand Concourse, Bronx, New York, Duration: 8/11/17-8/4/18, Days & Hours: Wed 13:00-18:00, Thu & Sat-Sun 11:00-18:00, Fri 11:00-20:00, www.bronxmuseum.org
