{"id":1250,"date":"2015-10-19T22:45:55","date_gmt":"2015-10-19T22:45:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/courses.candelalearning.com\/zelixart102\/?post_type=chapter&p=1250"},"modified":"2015-10-19T22:45:55","modified_gmt":"2015-10-19T22:45:55","slug":"bruce-nauman","status":"publish","type":"chapter","link":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/atd-herkimer-arthistory2\/chapter\/bruce-nauman\/","title":{"raw":"Bruce Nauman","rendered":"Bruce Nauman"},"content":{"raw":"Bruce Nauman\u2019s neon sign, The True Artist Helps the World by Revealing \u2028Mystic Truths<\/em>,<\/a> asks a multitude of questions with regard to the \u2028ways in which the twentieth\u00a0century conceived both avant-garde art and the role of the \u2028artist in society. If earlier European modernists, such as Mondrian, \u2028Malevich, and Kandinsky, sought to use art \u2028to reveal deep-seated truths about the human condition and the role of the artist \u2028in general, then Bruce Nauman\u2019s The True Artist Helps the World by Revealing \u2028Mystic Truths\u00a0<\/i>questions such transhistorical and universal \u2028statements. With regard to this work, Nauman said:<\/span>\r\n
The most difficult thing about the whole piece for me was the statement. It \u2028was a kind of test\u2014like when you say something out loud to see if you \u2028believe it. Once written down, I could see that the statement . . . was on \u2028the one hand a totally silly idea and yet, on the other hand, I believed it. \u2028It's true and not true at the same time. It depends on how you interpret it \u2028and how seriously you take yourself. For me it's still a very strong thought.<\/span><\/blockquote>\r\nBy using the mediums of mass culture (neon-signs) and of display (he originally \u2028hung the sign in his storefront studio), Nauman sought to bring questions\u2028 normally considered only by the high culture elite, such as the role and function of art and\u2028 the artist in society, to a wider audience. While early European modernists, \u2028such as Picasso, had borrowed widely from popular culture, they rarely displayed \u2028their work in the sites of popular culture. For Nauman, both the medium and \u2028the message were equally important; thus, by using a form of communication \u2028readily understood by all (neon signs had been widespread in modern industrial society) and by placing this message in the public view, Nauman let everyone ask \u2028and answer the question.<\/span>\r\n\r\nWhile it is perhaps the words that stand out most, the symbolism of the spiral (think of Robert Smithson\u2019s Spiral Jetty<\/i><\/a>, 1969), also deserves attention having been used for centuries in European and other civilizations, such\u2028 as megalithic and Chinese art, both as a symbol of time and of nature itself.<\/span>\r\n\r\nTheosophy in interesting in this regard, and since was such an important aspect of the early European Avant-garde. In \u2028particular, Theosophists believed that all religions are attempts to help humanity\u2028 to evolve to greater perfection, and that each religion therefore holds a portion of \u2028the truth. Through their materials, artists had sought to transform the physical into \u2028the spiritual. In this sense, Malevich, Mondrian, and Kandinsky sought to use the \u2028material of their art to transcend it: Nauman, and other of his generation, did not.<\/span>\r\n\r\nInstead, Nauman\u2019s work transgresses many genres of art making in that his work explores \u2028the implications of minimalism, conceptual, performance, and process \u2028art. In this sense we could call Nauman\u2019s art \u201cPostminimalism,\u201d a term coined\u2028 by the art critic Robert Pincus-Witten, in his article \"Eva Hesse: Post-Minimalism into Sublime\" (<\/span>Artforum<\/i> 10, number 3, November 1971, pages. 35-40). Artists such as Nauman, Acconci, and Hesse, favoured process instead of \u2028product, or rather the investigation over the end result. However, this is not to \u2028say they did not produce objects, such as the neon-sign by Nauman, only that \u2028within the presentation of the object, they also retained an examination of the \u2028processes that made that specific object.<\/span>\r\n\r\nIn this sense, Nauman's neon sign isn\u2019t only an object, it\u2019s a process, something\u2028 that continues to make us think about art, artist, and the role \u2028that language plays in our conception of both. The words continue to ask this of each beholder who encounters them. Does the artist, the \u201ctrue \u2028artist\u201d really \u201creveal mystical truths\u201d? Or confined to the \u2028specific culture that it was made in? If we are to believe the statement (remember, it is not\u2028 necessarily Nauman\u2019s, he merely borrows it from our shared culture), then we might, for example, recognise Leonardo \u2028da Vinci as a Neo-Platonic artist who showed us ultimate and essential truths through painting. On the other hand, if we reject the statement, then we\u2028 would probably recognize the artist as just another producer of a specific set of \u2028objects, that we call \u201cart.\u201d<\/span>\r\n\r\nThis type of logic and analytical thinking was influenced by Nauman\u2019s reading\u2028 of the philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein\u2019s Philosophical Investigations<\/i> (1953).\u2028 From Wittgenstein, Nauman took the idea that you put forth a proposition\/idea \u2028in the form of language and then examine its findings, irrespective of its proof or\u2028 conclusion. Nauman\u2019s \u201clanguage games,\u201d his neon-words, his proposition about\u2028 the nature of art and the artist continue to resonant in today\u2019s art world, in \u2028particular with regard to the value we place on the artist\u2019s actions and findings.<\/span>","rendered":"

Bruce Nauman\u2019s neon sign, The True Artist Helps the World by Revealing \u2028Mystic Truths<\/em>,<\/a> asks a multitude of questions with regard to the \u2028ways in which the twentieth\u00a0century conceived both avant-garde art and the role of the \u2028artist in society. If earlier European modernists, such as Mondrian, \u2028Malevich, and Kandinsky, sought to use art \u2028to reveal deep-seated truths about the human condition and the role of the artist \u2028in general, then Bruce Nauman\u2019s The True Artist Helps the World by Revealing \u2028Mystic Truths\u00a0<\/i>questions such transhistorical and universal \u2028statements. With regard to this work, Nauman said:<\/span><\/p>\n

The most difficult thing about the whole piece for me was the statement. It \u2028was a kind of test\u2014like when you say something out loud to see if you \u2028believe it. Once written down, I could see that the statement . . . was on \u2028the one hand a totally silly idea and yet, on the other hand, I believed it. \u2028It’s true and not true at the same time. It depends on how you interpret it \u2028and how seriously you take yourself. For me it’s still a very strong thought.<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

By using the mediums of mass culture (neon-signs) and of display (he originally \u2028hung the sign in his storefront studio), Nauman sought to bring questions\u2028 normally considered only by the high culture elite, such as the role and function of art and\u2028 the artist in society, to a wider audience. While early European modernists, \u2028such as Picasso, had borrowed widely from popular culture, they rarely displayed \u2028their work in the sites of popular culture. For Nauman, both the medium and \u2028the message were equally important; thus, by using a form of communication \u2028readily understood by all (neon signs had been widespread in modern industrial society) and by placing this message in the public view, Nauman let everyone ask \u2028and answer the question.<\/span><\/p>\n

While it is perhaps the words that stand out most, the symbolism of the spiral (think of Robert Smithson\u2019s Spiral Jetty<\/i><\/a>, 1969), also deserves attention having been used for centuries in European and other civilizations, such\u2028 as megalithic and Chinese art, both as a symbol of time and of nature itself.<\/span><\/p>\n

Theosophy in interesting in this regard, and since was such an important aspect of the early European Avant-garde. In \u2028particular, Theosophists believed that all religions are attempts to help humanity\u2028 to evolve to greater perfection, and that each religion therefore holds a portion of \u2028the truth. Through their materials, artists had sought to transform the physical into \u2028the spiritual. In this sense, Malevich, Mondrian, and Kandinsky sought to use the \u2028material of their art to transcend it: Nauman, and other of his generation, did not.<\/span><\/p>\n

Instead, Nauman\u2019s work transgresses many genres of art making in that his work explores \u2028the implications of minimalism, conceptual, performance, and process \u2028art. In this sense we could call Nauman\u2019s art \u201cPostminimalism,\u201d a term coined\u2028 by the art critic Robert Pincus-Witten, in his article “Eva Hesse: Post-Minimalism into Sublime” (<\/span>Artforum<\/i> 10, number 3, November 1971, pages. 35-40). Artists such as Nauman, Acconci, and Hesse, favoured process instead of \u2028product, or rather the investigation over the end result. However, this is not to \u2028say they did not produce objects, such as the neon-sign by Nauman, only that \u2028within the presentation of the object, they also retained an examination of the \u2028processes that made that specific object.<\/span><\/p>\n

In this sense, Nauman’s neon sign isn\u2019t only an object, it\u2019s a process, something\u2028 that continues to make us think about art, artist, and the role \u2028that language plays in our conception of both. The words continue to ask this of each beholder who encounters them. Does the artist, the \u201ctrue \u2028artist\u201d really \u201creveal mystical truths\u201d? Or confined to the \u2028specific culture that it was made in? If we are to believe the statement (remember, it is not\u2028 necessarily Nauman\u2019s, he merely borrows it from our shared culture), then we might, for example, recognise Leonardo \u2028da Vinci as a Neo-Platonic artist who showed us ultimate and essential truths through painting. On the other hand, if we reject the statement, then we\u2028 would probably recognize the artist as just another producer of a specific set of \u2028objects, that we call \u201cart.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

This type of logic and analytical thinking was influenced by Nauman\u2019s reading\u2028 of the philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein\u2019s Philosophical Investigations<\/i> (1953).\u2028 From Wittgenstein, Nauman took the idea that you put forth a proposition\/idea \u2028in the form of language and then examine its findings, irrespective of its proof or\u2028 conclusion. Nauman\u2019s \u201clanguage games,\u201d his neon-words, his proposition about\u2028 the nature of art and the artist continue to resonant in today\u2019s art world, in \u2028particular with regard to the value we place on the artist\u2019s actions and findings.<\/span><\/p>\n\n\t\t\t

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