The exhibition took place on March 27, 2009, at 21.00, within a home gallery set up in a typical block of flats living room.
I thought two pupils were not enough. But it is easier to work with a smaller number of people. When I brought over the scale models, the rather abstract information I was trying to communicate became intelligible, tangible even I could say. To hold a piece of art history in your hand is more convincing than to gaze at a digital image projected on a wall, listening to a series of comments you don't understand, because you do not know the words. (formalism, conceptual art, etc.)
And when you repaint Rothko or when you install a fat corner with a palette knife you understand in a more direct manner what it is all about, than if you said that Beuys was a great artist with a strange and complicated personal mythology. I discovered an efficient pedagogic tool, which bypassed intellectual discourse entering personal space, inside an area where manual work can still be engraved in the mind, guiding you afterwards between the works inside a great museum.
Claudia Cristea and Sanziana Marin were the only pupils in the high school who were interested in the subject, and who were at the same time willing to stay in school after 14.00, when classes ended, in order to find out what I had to say. Together we were the artists producing the works, the museographers, curators and target public of the exhibitions in the small, scale model museum.
Because they agreed to work with me, I had the chance to organize my knowledge on the history of art between 1950-1990. I also satisfied the very personal need of approaching some of the artists that I love, but that I thought I had exhausted through reading. I also enjoyed the conceptual frame I had imagined, because the history of art is built around the idea of authorship, and one can only try to make replicas of significant pieces using this type of strategy.
I have not earned money, on the contrary I invested in the objects and the classes I held. In exchange, I was able to reduce a period of art history to the scale of a miniature. In the process, I enjoyed other people's work, but also my personal initiative in which I found meaning, as the interaction was interesting and I could communicate some of the things I knew.
The exhibition was made up of 23 scale models of important works of art produced between 1950 and 1990. They were distributed through a raffle or tombola procedure to the public at the opening. Because of limited space, access was invitation based only. To this end, 10 invitations were offered to those who wanted them through a public announcement on feeder.ro.
The objects were accompanied by written installation instructions. The Fat Corner by Beuys had not been installed yet, so it does not appear in the documentation of the exhibition display.
1. Barnett Newman – The Wild / 1950 (shaped canvas)
Glue it with blu tack or double sided tape in a vertical position, on a wall or on other flat surface.
2. Mark Rothko – Orange and yellow / 1956 (abstract expressionism)
Glue it with blu tack or double sided tape in a vertical position, on a wall or on other flat surface.
3. Barnett Newman – Onement VI / 1953 (abstract expressionism)
Glue it with blu tack or double sided tape in a vertical position, on a wall or on other flat surface.
4. Joseph Albers – Apparition / 1959 (geometric abstraction)
Glue it with blu tack or double sided tape in a vertical position, on a wall or on other flat surface.
5. Jackson Pollock – Untiled / 1950 (abstract expressionism)
Glue it with blu tack or double sided tape in a vertical position, on a wall or on other flat surface.
6. Ellsworth Kelly – Orange Curve I / 1982 (shaped canvas)
Glue it with blu tack or double sided tape in a vertical position, on a wall or on other flat surface.
7. Ellswoth Kelly – Untitled / 1980 (shaped canvas)
Glue it with blu tack or double sided tape in a vertical position, on a wall or on other flat surface.
8. Frank Stella – More or Less / 1964 (shaped canvas)
Glue it with blu tack or double sided tape in a vertical position, on a wall or on other flat surface.
9. Frank Stella – Tomlinson Court Park / 1959 (shaped canvas)
Glue it with blu tack or double sided tape in a vertical position, on a wall or on other flat surface.
10. Richard Tuttle – Wave / 1965 (post-minimalism)
Glue it with blu tack or double sided tape in a vertical position, on a wall or on other flat surface.
11. Richard Tuttle – Twin River / 1965 (post-minimalism)
Glue it with blu tack or double sided tape in a vertical position, on a wall or on other flat surface.
12. After Joseph Kosuth – Museum / 1965 (conceptual art)
Glue the image and text with blu tack or double sided tape in a vertical position, on a wall or on other flat surface. Place the small model underneath.
13. After Joseph Kosuth – Toy / 1965 (conceptual art)
Glue the image and text with blu tack or double sided tape in a vertical position, on a wall or on other flat surface. Place the small model underneath.
14. After Joseph Kosuth – Chestnut / 1965 (conceptual art)
Glue the image and text with blu tack or double sided tape in a vertical position, on a wall or on other flat surface. Place the chestnut underneath.
15. After Joseph Kosuth – Letter / 1965 (conceptual art)
Glue the image and text with blu tack or double sided tape in a vertical position, on a wall or on other flat surface. Place the letter underneath and gue it in a vertical position with blue tack or double tape.
16. Robert Morris – Untitled / 1964 (minimalism)
Glue the triangle with blu tack or plasticine in the corner of a room or another corner - from a box, etc. The margins of the triangle should not touch any of the neighboring surfaces, as if it would hover in mid-air.
17. Donald Judd – Untitled / 1990 (minimalism)
Glue the ten modules on a vertical surface, using double sided tape, in a ladder formation, taking care at the alignment. The distance between two modules is the same as the thickness of one. Between the last module in the lower area and the horizontal surface the same one-module distance must be kept.
18. Carl Andre – Zinc Plain / 1969 (minimalism)
LAy the small squares on a horizontal surface, preferably the cover of a notebook. The squares are numbered on the bac from 1 to 16. Because they are not perfectly square, they form a puzzle. The modules must be arranged in horizontal rows of 1 to 4, 5 to 8 and so on, numbers upward. Then, using a second notebook that is placed on top of the first, flip the already organized modules on the other side. Now they can be installed on any horizontal surface, as they are in correct order.
19. Robert Smithson – Corner Piece / 1968 (land art)
Glue the mirrors with blu tack or plasticine in the corner of a room or in another corner - from a box, etc. Place two of them vertically and one should horizontally. After making sure the mirrors are fixed to the walls and floor and that they completely cover the corner, the sand and pebbles are poured in the corner. Arrange the sand in such a manner that a triangle is visible from the standpoint of the viewer.
20. Richard Long – Circle Stones / 1996 (land art)
Place the pebbles on a flat surface and then arrange them in a circle.
21. Eva Hesse – Schema / 1968 (post-minimalism)
Place the plasticine matrix on a flat surface.
22. Joseph Beuys – Fat Corner / 1963 (conceptual art / installation)
Take the fat our of the jar and using a spoon or a palette knife place it in the corner of a room or of a box, so that from the standpoint of the viewer a triangle is visible.
23. Hans Haacke - Condensation Wall / 1966 (conceptual art)
Place the small aquarium on a flat surface, preferably in a place where there is light. The heat inside the room or the sun rays will set in motion the water evaporation cycle.
