Bruce Nauman

Bruce Nauman
Disappearing Acts
17 March to 26 August 2018

Schaulager presents a long overdue retrospective exhibition showcasing the work of one of the most important artists of our day. The exhibition “Bruce Nauman: Disappearing Acts” has been organized by the Laurenz Foundation, Schaulager Basel and the Museum of Modern Art, New York.

25 years have passed since the full spectrum of Bruce Nauman’s oeuvre was last given due attention. The exhibition includes video works, drawings, photographs, sculptures, neon pieces, and large-scale installations. In addition to key masterpieces, there are also lesser-known works and, as a world premiere, the 3D video projection Contrapposto Split, the monumental sculpture Leaping Foxes as well as the first ever showing in Europe of his recently created Contrapposto Studies, i through vii.

Born in the American Midwest in 1941, Nauman now lives and works in New Mexico. His groundbreaking oeuvre has made him a central figure in contemporary art, exploring themes such as language and physicality while at the same time plumbing the depths of power structures and regulatory frameworks. By insistently calling into question our aesthetic and moral values, as well as our habitual ways of seeing, Bruce Nauman challenges our perceptions and imaginings in ever new ways. “Bruce Nauman: Disappearing Acts” surveys five decades of this elusive artist’s many-faceted oeuvre, which, to this day, has lost nothing of its immediacy, freshness, and topicality.

Unmistakable as his authorship may be, Bruce Nauman nevertheless continues, time and again, to produce astonishingly diverse and uniquely radical works. His output cannot easily be typecast, because each neon piece, each complex installation, each sculpture is too autonomous for that. Yet there are themes that run like leitmotifs throughout Nauman’s work, such as the studio, the body, language, or models, sound and tone.

His modus operandi is shaped by a seemingly endless loop of repeatedly addressing the same fundamental subjects and issues that he has always engaged with, albeit in ever new and different ways. “Bruce Nauman: Disappearing Acts” charts a path through the many-faceted oeuvre of this keenly experimental artist. From his earliest sculptural works to his very latest video installation using highly complex 3D imaging processes—premiered in this exhibition—the retrospective follows a loosely woven chronological order with frequent digressions. This means that newer works can be found juxtaposed with older ones, grouped together to highlight previously unacknowledged aspects.

Highlights

UNTITLED, 1965

Bruce Nauman created his first fiberglass sculptures while he was still a student at the University of California, Davis. They bear witness to the experimental and unconventional approach that he took as a young artist to the process of casting and molding. The plaster mold that Nauman used twice to cast this untitled work in fiberglass and polyester resin, was based on a handmade clay model. The fragility of the material and the unfinished surface texture are the distinctive hallmarks of this “soft-shape” sculpture.

LIGHT TRAP FOR HENRY MOORE NO. 1, 1967

Nauman created the bright outlines of this seated “light-figure” by capturing the motion of a flashlight in a dark chamber, setting a so-called “trap” for the famous British sculptor Henry Moore. The piece, titled Light Trap for Henry Moore No. 1 (1967), reflects the attitude of a young artist who knows that he is part of a tradition on which he has to take a stance.

Corridor Installation (Nick Wilder Installation), 1970

Nauman’s Corridor Installation (Nick Wilder Installation) (1970) takes the form of a walk-through corridor complex in which the artist places the focus firmly on the viewer’s experience. The corridors trigger a whole slew of different spatial perceptions. Some are fitted with video cameras that film the visitors and transmit the live footage directly to monitors. In this way, participation is inextricably linked with questions of control and surveillance—issues that are still contentious today.

Model for Trench and Four Buried Passages, 1977

The monumental dimensions of Nauman’s Model for Trench and Four Buried Passages (1977) make it an impressive example of his maquette-like designs for subterranean spaces and tunnel systems. As a model on a scale of 1:2 the raw construction of plaster and fiberglass challenges our powers of imagination while at the same time evoking a strongly sculptural presence.

One Hundred Live and Die, 1984

Bruce Nauman’s largest neon piece, One Hundred Live and Die (1984), located on the lower floor, glints at us from afar like a huge advertising billboard. A total of 100 brightly colored three-word sentences span the arc between life and death. During the 1980s, many of Nauman’s works increasingly addressed questions relating to the fundamental conditions of human existence.

Green Horses, 1988

Green Horses (1988) is one of Bruce Nauman’s very first multi-channel video installations. Steeped in green, against a purple background, the artist, in cowboy boots and broad-brimmed Stetson, rides a horse through the barren landscape of New Mexico. Here, the work of the rancher and horse trainer are inextricably intertwined with that of the artist.

Leaping Foxes, 2018

For his earlier animal sculptures, Bruce Nauman had already used the kind of foam forms commonly used in taxidermy. In his latest work, Leaping Foxes (2018), deer, caribou and foxes tumble acrobatically to create an imposing pyramid. Affixed by wire cables, the massive formation freezes in standstill just above the floor.

Contrapposto Studies, i through vii, 2015/2016

Shown in Europe for the very first time, Bruce Nauman’s complex HD video installation Contrapposto Studies, i through vii (2015/16) features the idiosyncratic gait of the artist based on the classical sculptural pose known as contrapposto. Having invented this gait back in 1968 for his video Walk with Contrapposto (1968), Nauman now reprises it some fifty years later.

Bouncing Two Balls Between the Floor and Ceiling with Changing Rhythms, 1967–1968

Today, Nauman’s early film and video performances rank among his most iconic works. In these playfully exercised studio performances, Nauman achieves artistic expression through the application of simple techniques. In Bouncing Two Balls Between the Floor and Ceiling with Changing Rhythms (1967–68) the to-and-fro of two balls bouncing between the floor and ceiling of his studio produce an autonomous rhythm.

Mapping the Studio II with color shift, flip, flop, & flip/flop (Fat Chance John Cage), 2001

The empty studio and the absence of the artist form the starting point for Bruce Nauman’s masterwork Mapping the Studio II with color shift, flip, flop, & flip/flop (Fat Chance John Cage) (2001). Over a period of several weeks, Nauman used an infrared camera to film and observe his own studio by night. The result is a space-filling video installation in which viewers can imagine themselves actually standing inside the artist’s studio. Time and again, the supposed stillness of the night is surprisingly disturbed.

Contrapposto Split, 2017

Further Information

Biography

Bruce Nauman was born in Fort Wayne, Indiana, in 1941; he grew up
near Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and has lived in New Mexico since
the late 1970s.

More Works

Your ticket for the Schaulager exhibtion “Bruce Nauman: Disappearing Acts” also includes one visit to the Kunstmuseum Basel Collection.

Bruce Nauman and Basel

By the early 1970s, a number of Nauman’s early films, sculptures and drawings had already been acquired by the Kunstmuseum, then under the directorship of Franz Meyer, and by the Emanuel Hoffmann Foundation.