MINNEAPOLIS, February 11 2016—The Walker Art Center is pleased to present
Less Than One, an international, multigenerational group exhibition offering indepth
presentations of work from the 1960s to the present by 16 artists central to
the Walker’s collection. On view April 7–December 31, 2016 in Galleries 1, 2, 3, and
the Perlman Gallery, signature artworks from artists including Sigmar Polke, Lutz
Bacher, Kara Walker, Dieter Roth, and Jasper Johns will be presented alongside
major new acquisitions of work by Ericka Beckman, Trisha Brown, Adrian Piper, and
Pope.L, among others.
“It’s a remarkable moment to present these installation-scaled works, as many of
them are first gallery appearances of important new additions to the Walker’s
collection, alongside multidisciplinary artists who have anchored the Walker’s
collection for some time,” says Fionn Meade, curator of the exhibition and the
Walker’s Artistic Director. “Less Than One points to the Walker’s history of prescient
acquisitions and how the collections continue to breach the boundaries of artistic
disciplines.”
The show’s title is drawn from the collection of essays Less Than One by Nobel
Prize-winning poet and author Joseph Brodsky. The text offers a meditation on the
nature of human existence and artistic expression, suggesting that a person—
defined in political and aesthetic terms—is always “less than one.” He argues that
one can never be a discrete whole at any moment in time, driving the artist to
pursue identity through words, images, and an uneasy embrace of artistic personae.
Many works in the exhibition are by some of the most talked about contemporary
artists today whose construction and performance of identity and use of graphics in
repetition is central to their practices.
Surveying a range of approaches—from painting and sculpture to drawing, installation, moving image, performance, and photography— the exhibition sequences groupings of works by each artist that underscore the often provocative, historically charged, and risk-taking nature of the Walker’s multidisciplinary collection. The exhibition includes pieces by Lutz Bacher, Ericka Beckman, Trisha Brown, Paul Chan, Trisha Donnelly, Renée Green, Charline von Heyl, Jasper Johns, Joan Jonas, Meredith Monk, Adrian Piper, Sigmar Polke, Pope.L, James Richards, Dieter Roth, and Kara Walker.
Acquisitions and gifts on view in the Walker’s galleries for the first time:
Ericka Beckman, You the Better, Film Installation (1983/2015)
Adrian Piper, The Mythic Being: Sol’s Drawings #1–5 (1974)
Trisha Brown, selection of nine works on paper (1973-1980)
Charline von Heyl, Folk Tales (2013) and Children’s Encyclopedia (2014)
Pope.L, selection of ten works from his ongoing Skin Set series (selections from 2001-2012)
James Richards, Rosebud (2013) and Radio at Night (2015)
Joan Jonas, Songdelay (1973) and Glass Puzzle (1973)
Renée Green, Bequest (1991)
Curated by Fionn Meade, Walker Art Center Artistic Director, with Victoria Sung, Curatorial Assistant.
OPENING EVENTS
Filmmakers in Conversation: Ericka Beckman and Jay Sanders
Thursday, April 7
7 pm, Free with gallery admission
Walker Cinema
Experimental filmmaker Ericka Beckman will be joined by Jay Sanders (Curator and Curator of Performance at the Whitney Museum of American Art) for a discussion of her expansive repertoire of work. Beckman’s film installation You the Better (1983/2015) is featured in the exhibition Less Than One in the Perlman Gallery.
Less than One Opening Day Program
An afternoon with Renée Green
Saturday, April 9, 2016
2 pm, Free with gallery admission
Walker Cinema
Renée Green’s installation Bequest (1991), on view for the first time at the Walker, provides insight into the beginning stages of this transformative artist’s career. On opening day of the exhibition, the artist will read from her recent collection of writings Other Planes of There and discuss the evolution of her work after a screening of her latest film Begin Again, Begin Again with exhibition curator and Walker Artistic Director Fionn Meade.
This program is made possible by generous support from Aaron and Carol Mack.
April Moving Image Commissions
Leslie Thornton with James Richards: Exquisite Cinema
Saturday, April 9, 2016
7 pm, Free
Walker Cinema
In connection with the premiere of Leslie Thornton’s Moving Image Commission and the opening of Less Than One, video artists Leslie Thornton and James Richards present an exquisite corpse of found and original footage. Their curated reel will culminate in the inaugural screening of Leslie Thornton’s They Were Just People (2016). The two artists will be joined in conversation by Bentson Moving Image Scholar Isla Leaver-Yap for a discussion about their selection and recently commissioned works.
Thornton’s video is the third installment in the Moving Image Commissions, a series that responds to key artists in the Walker’s Ruben Bentson Moving Image Collection. Initiated in May 2015 with work by Moyra Davey and James Richards that was inspired by Derek Jarman, and a second set of premieres by Shahryar Nashat and Uri Aran responding to the work of Marcel Broodthaers in February 2016, this third installment in response to Bruce Conner is accompanied by an exclusive ‘look back’ at all the Moving Image Commissions to date.
Commissioned by the Walker Art Center with major support from the Bentson Foundation.
RELATED EVENTS
Meredith Monk in Conversation with Philip Bither
Thursday, April 14, 2016
7 pm, Free
McGuire Theater
Composer/singer/director/choreographer and filmmaker Meredith Monk joins Director and McGuire Senior of Performing Arts Curator Philip Bither for a convivial and insightful conversation about her life and art. Monk’s pioneering film and sculpture installation 16 Millimeter Earrings, first exhibited at the Walker in the exhibition Art Performs Life (1998), will be on view for the first time since entering the Walker’s permanent collection in 2010, featured in Less Than One.
Presented as part of the Gertrude Lippincott Talking Dance Series made possible by generous support from Judith Brin Ingber.
Target Free Thursday Nights sponsored by Target™
Meredith Monk and Vocal Ensemble
The Soul’s Messenger, Celebrating 50 Years of New Music
Friday, April 15, 2016
8 pm, $44, $36, $28, $20 ($40, $33, $26, $20 Walker members)
The O’Shaughnessy Auditorium, St. Catherine University
“[Monk] may loom even larger as the new century unfolds, and later generations will envy those who got to see her live.” —New Yorker
Theater director/choreographer/filmmaker/interdisciplinary artist Meredith Monk is also one of most revered figures in contemporary American music and performance. Her groundbreaking exploration of the voice as an instrument expands the boundaries of musical composition, creating landscapes of sound that unearth feelings, energies, and memories for which we have no words. Monk and her acclaimed Vocal Ensemble will showcase her range as a composer and her engagement with performance as a vehicle for spiritual transformation. Celebrating her 50th season as a creator and performer, the Walker continues its long history with Monk by welcoming her back to the Twin Cities after a seven-year hiatus.
Copresented with the O’Shaughnessy as part of its Women of Substance series.
Support provided by the Goodale Family Foundation.
