MG+MSUM

LECTURE | Darko Fritz: Notions of the Program in the Art of the 1960s – Concrete, Computer-generated and Conceptual Art
Thursday, 15 November 2018, at 6 p.m., +MSUM
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Darko Fritz

Notions of the Program in the Art of the 1960s – Concrete, Computer-generated and Conceptual Art

Case study: [New] Tendencies

 

Thursday, 15 November 2018, at 6 p.m., +MSUM

 

The lecture is a part of the opening program of  Sites of Sustainability. Pavilions, Manifestos, and Crypts exhibition.

 

The presentation will examine several exhibitions, artists’ practices and related theories on the notion of the program in art. Several tendencies of the art of the 1960s that are, at first sight, vastly different from and mutually exclusive of each other can be viewed throughout the notions of the program. The first discourses toward the notion of the program in art appear in the form of Concrete / Neo-constructivist / Luminokinetic art and the like, the second discourse in computer-generated art, and the third in conceptual art. Umberto Eco writes a text on “Arte Programmata” for the catalogue of an exhibition of the same name in Milan in 1962. At the New tendencies movement and network (1961–1973) organizers set up computer generated works in relation to constructive and kinetic art (1968/69) and to conceptual art (1973). Almost no communication was ever established between the three types of artistic practices and related theories in the 1960s. And very few exhibitions presented these kinds of works together in the time of their production. The Tendencies 5 exhibition in Zagreb of 1973 is the rare, exceptional example in art history that connected and presented the three frames ­– concrete, computer and conceptual art – under the same roof. New Tendencies tried to bring these three artistic practices together through the notion of the program and through works not executed by the artists themselves.

 

The presentation will be accompanied by both audio-visual documentation from the 1960s and new recordings, in particular from the exhibitionsit international [New] Tendencies Computers and Visual Research, Zagreb 1961–1973, Neue Galerie, Graz, 2007 and ZKM (Zentrum fur Kunst und Medientechnologie), Karlsruhe, 2008–2009, curated by Darko Fritz (co-curated by Peter Weibel at ZKM). 

 

http://darkofritz.net

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Since the late 1980s, the work of artist, curator and researcher Darko Fritz has revolved around a significant investigation into the use of technology in culture. His curatorial work and research on New Tendencies and early digital art has earned international acclaim with exhibitions at HDLU, Zagreb (2000), Neue Galerie, Graz (2007), ZKM, Karlsruhe (2008-09) and Akbank, Istanbul (2014). Fritz edited Media Art in Croatia at the portal Culturenet. The research "The beginning of digital arts in the Netherlands (1955–1980)", was awarded a grant by the Mondriaan Foundation. Fritz is the founder and programmer of the grey) (area – space for contemporary and media art since 2006.

 

He is a member of professional organizations HDLU (visual arts), ULUPUH (design), and AICA (art criticism).

 

http://darkofritz.net

 

 
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