STrUCTioN - Taschen

December 2012
February 2013
Land of expression
Savage caricatures
The earth as canvas
In the mid-60s, artists in the USA and Europe began planning works for sites outside
the narrow boundaries of galleries and museums. It began with ephemeral enhancements
or traces left in desolate landscapes, in the deserts of America, or in the moors
of Scotland. Following this were spectacular earthen sculptures of gigantic proportions,
some of which are still in the process of completion today. One distinguishing
feature of Land Art is its critical preoccupation with the tradition of sculpture.
Sculpture can now be an earthwork excavation, a field of metal poles, a buried hut, a
trace in the grass, or even a book. Another of the movement’s special characteristics is
its emphasis on site-specific, outdoor works intended to lastingly alter our perception
of places, and to set new parameters in art production and reception.
Artists included:
Carl Andre, Alice Aycock, Herbert Bayer, Christo & Jeanne Claude, Walter De
Maria, Agnes Denes, Jan Dibbets, Hamish Fulton, Andy Goldsworthy, Michael
Heizer, Nancy Holt, Peter Hutchinson, Patricia Johanson, Dani Karavan, Richard
Long, Mary Miss, Robert Morris, Dennis Oppenheim, Charles Ross, Robert
Smithson, Alan Sonfist, James Turrell
Back in Print!
Land Art
Michael Lailach
Softcover with flaps, 7.3 x 9.1 in., 96 pp.
978-3-8228-5613-0
$ 9.99 / CAD 11.99
Acerbic painting as social commentary
George Grosz was one of the most important exponents of Dadaism, and therefore of
political painting in general. He not only condemned both militarism and bourgeois
culture, but also set himself in opposition to traditional forms of art. The decisive element
in Grosz’s paintings is their content: in them he pointed out defects in the political
and social conditions, literally arraigning them before the public. For Grosz,
painting served as a political instrument: “I drew and painted from a sense of contradiction
and through my work tried to convince the world that it was ugly, sick, and
phony.” Fascinated by the metropolis, Grosz depicted the wild and
dissolute life in the bars and nightclubs of the Weimar Republic in the 1920s. He
directed his attention to the shady side of life and filled his canvas with caricatures
of distorted figures. Grosz never permitted human beings to emerge as individuals,
but instead always portrayed types, as representatives of a social level or class. After
the publication of his candidly drawn “pornographic illustrations,” Grosz fell under
strong criticism in the 1920s. The Nazis castigated his works as “degenerate art.”
Back in Print!
Grosz
Ivo Kranzfelder
Softcover with flaps, 7.3 x 9.1 in., 96 pp.
978-3-8228-0891-7
$ 9.99 / CAD 11.99
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Page 24: Beatriz Milhazes, Gamboa, 2010,
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