Jimmie Durham: A Matter of Life and Death and Singing
Works 1964-2012
Edited by Anders Kreuger. Text by Bart De Baere, Guy Brett, Jimmie Durham, Richard William Hill, Anders Kreuger.
Born in Arkansas in 1940 and based in Europe since 1994, the Cherokee Jimmie Durham has spent his life alternating between the world of contemporary art and his work as an activist for the American Native Indian movement and United Nations representative of the International Indian Treaty Council. The politics of Durham’s art also take place on the broadest terms: “My work might be considered ‘interventionist’ because it works against the two foundations of the European tradition: Belief and Architecture,” he writes. “My work is against the connection of art to architecture, to the ‘statue,’ to monumentality.” Durham’s art freely blends writing and performance, sculpture and permanence and the personal and political into series of often anthropomorphic collage-like installations. With his notion of the artist as someone who rearranges the objects of society, Durham has developed a practice of “interruption” and estrangement as a tool against belief systems and the corrosive influence of colonialist culture, mixing plastic tubing with bone, printed words with video, and witty anecdote with devastating critique. A Matter of Life and Death and Singing is generously illustrated and researched and accompanies a comprehensive retrospective at the MuHKA, Antwerp, covering his full career, with newly commissioned essays and Durham’s own writings.
Featured image is reproduced from Jimmie Durham: A Matter of Life and Death and Singing.
"Don't work for yourself, don't say, 'I'm doing work for myself,' don't say, 'I'm doing work because it pleases me to do work.' Whether or not that's true, forget about it and think about other people. Don't do your work for your friends, don't do work for yourself, do work for everybody, address humanity; that's what we want to do, we want to address humanity. Not exactly with something to say. It's yourself among other selves, that's what it is; it's a continual thing."—Jimmie Durham, in conversation with Bart De Baere, reproduced from A Matter of Life and Death and Singing.
FORMAT: Pbk, 9.5 x 12.25 in. / 160 pgs / 150 color. LIST PRICE: U.S. $45.00 LIST PRICE: CANADA $55 ISBN: 9783037642894 PUBLISHER: JRP|Ringier AVAILABLE: 9/30/2012 DISTRIBUTION: D.A.P. RETAILER DISC: TRADE PUBLISHING STATUS: Out of print AVAILABILITY: Not available TERRITORY: WORLD Excl FR DE AU CH
Jimmie Durham: A Matter of Life and Death and Singing Works 1964-2012
Published by JRP|Ringier. Edited by Anders Kreuger. Text by Bart De Baere, Guy Brett, Jimmie Durham, Richard William Hill, Anders Kreuger.
Born in Arkansas in 1940 and based in Europe since 1994, the Cherokee Jimmie Durham has spent his life alternating between the world of contemporary art and his work as an activist for the American Native Indian movement and United Nations representative of the International Indian Treaty Council. The politics of Durham’s art also take place on the broadest terms: “My work might be considered ‘interventionist’ because it works against the two foundations of the European tradition: Belief and Architecture,” he writes. “My work is against the connection of art to architecture, to the ‘statue,’ to monumentality.” Durham’s art freely blends writing and performance, sculpture and permanence and the personal and political into series of often anthropomorphic collage-like installations. With his notion of the artist as someone who rearranges the objects of society, Durham has developed a practice of “interruption” and estrangement as a tool against belief systems and the corrosive influence of colonialist culture, mixing plastic tubing with bone, printed words with video, and witty anecdote with devastating critique. A Matter of Life and Death and Singing is generously illustrated and researched and accompanies a comprehensive retrospective at the MuHKA, Antwerp, covering his full career, with newly commissioned essays and Durham’s own writings.
