Marian Goodman

Dan Graham

03 Feb - 17 Mar 2007

DAN GRAHAM

3 February – 17 March 2007
Opening: Saturday February 3rd from 6 to 8 pm.

Marian Goodman Gallery is pleased to announce a new exhibition by Dan Graham which will open on Saturday, February 3rd and close on March 17th 2007.
On view will be a new pavilion entitled Mannerism /Rococo. This pavilion is a narrow corridor-like structure with two concave sides, which contrasts undistorted classical perspective with Mannerist ‘fish-eye’1 lens distortions. Graham refers loosely to the curves of the French Rococo, whilst also paying homage to Bruce Nauman.
Like other projects of Dan Graham, Mannerism/Rococo is rooted in everyday urban life and activity. His pavilions are hybrids of functional architectural structures - like bus-shelters and classical garden pavilions (found in parks from the Renaissance onwards) - and traditional sculpture. They are constructed mostly of two-way mirror, a ubiquitous material used in inner-city office buildings for purposes of power and surveillance, which Graham turns into a much more fluid material that fluctuates between reflectivity and transparency, thus subverting its fixed power dynamic. Graham gives us an ambiguous vantage point in his works of seeing oneself in the world, and an ambiguous one at that, both reflective and transparent.
In the basement of the gallery we will present videos of architectural projects at MIT Cambridge, Massachusetts (Yin/Yang pavilion), at the Hayward Gallery, London (Waterloo Sunset), and at the Serralves Foundation, Porto (Double Exposure).
In 2002 Graham realized the Yin/Yang pavilion, (1997/2002) for a dormitory designed by Steven Holl at MIT University. He described the work, a kind of mini-Zen garden and ‘pond’, as a reaction to the sentimentalizing and dilution of eastern philosophy in mid 1990’s art making. With his characteristic mixture of subtle irony and the conflation of Pop and socio-political sensibilities, Graham created a multi-layered, playful and yet contemplative environment.
In the same year, he was commissioned to work on the renovation of the Hayward Gallery in London in collaboration with Graham Haworth Architects. In addition to the extension of the lobby, Graham conceived Waterloo Sunset (2002-2003), a ‘drop in centre for children and old people and a space for viewing cartoons’. The elliptical pavilion is a space for social interaction, learning and fun that is open to the public during and in between exhibitions. It houses six touch-sensitive monitors showing cartoons selected by Dan Graham and artist’s videos.
Also on view will be a video of Double Exposure (1995/2003), a triangular pavilion installed at the Serralves Foundation. One side of the pavilion consists of a large ektachrome of the surrounding landscape taken on a Spring day. It is through this static image that the present ever-changing landscape is viewed. This allows for a time-delay sensation without any mechanical means
Other pavilions have included: Homage to Vilanova Artigas (2006) realized for the last Sao Paolo Biennial, Bisected Triangle Inside Curve (2002) for Madison Square Park, New York, the Café Bravo for Kunst-Werke, Berlin (1998), the Children’s Pavilion (1989-91) (with Jeff Wall), the Rooftop Urban Park Project for Dia Center for the Arts, New York (1981/91), and Skateboard Pavilion (1989). During the 1990s he has been offered public commissions throughout North America and Europe. In 2001 Dan Graham was awarded the médaille de vermeil by the City of Paris. He is one of the most influential artists for a younger generation of international artists.
Graham’s work will be subject of a major US retrospective scheduled to open in January 2009 at MoCA, Los Angeles, and touring to the Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, and other venues. In 2000-2001 Graham’s work was featured in a major European retrospective survey, (an accompanying catalogue raisonné, Dan Graham: Works 1965-2000 has been published by the Richter Verlag), which opened at the Museu de Arte Contemporanea de Serralves, Porto, and traveled to the Musée d’Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris, the Kröller-Müller Museum, Otterlo, the Kiasma Museum of Contemporary Art, Helsinki, and the Kunsthalle, Düsseldorf. In 2003 he exhibited at the Contemporary Art Gallery in Vancouver, Canada. Another retrospective was shown at the Chiba City Museum of Art, Chiba, and Kitakyushu Municipal Museum of Art, Fukuoka, Japan.
Dan Graham was also invited by the City of Paris to conceive one of the nine works installed at the stations of the new Parisian tram which was inaugurated on December 14th, 2006. Dan Graham’s pavilion is located at Porte de Versailles.
©Marian Goodman Gallery

© Dan Graham
Mannerism/Roww, 2007
 

Tags: Dan Graham, Bruce Nauman, Jeff Wall