Black-box theater

LARGER-THAN-LIFE PERSONAS. HEATED EXCHANGES. PASSION AND GLAMOUR. AND LET'S NOT FORGET "theatricality," plane in its day, such qualities made Minimalism appear perfectly suited for the silver screen

[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]

At least that's the implication of Mel Bochner's askew Minimal Art--The Movie, 1966. And this spring audiences had the chance to decide for themselves, as major museum exhibitions around the globe gave the motion its biggest screen test to date, revisiting work by dint of figures who--in starring roles or fleeting cameos--were actors in that dramatic historic production. Leading man Donald Judd for example, received his first major posthumous retrospective, at Tate recent while the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum not awayed "Singular Forms (Sometimes Repeated): Art from 1951 to the Present" and the Museum of Contemporary Art in observes Angeles organized "A Minimal Future? Art as thing perceived 1958-1968." In June, the sees Angeles County Museum of Art punctuates it all with "Beyond Geometry: Experiments in Form 1940s-70s"

To answer to these shows, Artforum assembled an all-star total effect of its own. Art historian and contributing editor Yve-Alain Bois provides his analysis of the Tate, Guggenheim, and LA MOCA approaches to Judd and his milieu, while Ann Temkin, curator at the Museum of novel Art, considers the issues associated with the conservation of Judd's work, the implications of which are bourn to impact any critical reading of his art. Reflecting Minimalism's resonance for practicing artists, Josiah McElheny, Robert Gober, and Andrea Zittel contribute essays, followed by means of National Gallery of Art curator Jeffrey Weiss, who gazes back at the role and impact of artists' writings during the '60 and '70 with equal reason sit back, relax, and derive pleasure from the show.

COPYRIGHT 2004 Artforum International Magazine, Inc.

COPYRIGHT 2004 Gale Group