gordon matta clark
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Gordon Matta-Clark1943-1978
Jennifer Wells
“By un-doing a building there are many aspects of the social
condition against which I am gesturing: to open a state of
enclosure which had been preconditioned not only by
physical necessity but by the industry that profligates suburban and urban boxes as a context for
insuring a passive, isolated consumer—a virtually captive
audience.” Gordon Matta-Clark, 1977
Bronx Floor: Floor Hole Bronx Floors: Threshole
1972 Gelatin Silver Prints“It was an activity that attempted to transform place into a state of mind by opening walls where doors never were or looking beneath the carpet to clear away the floor.”
Reality Properties: Fake Estates "Maspeth Onion" (Block 2406, Lot 148), 1973Gelatin silver print and documents
Reality Properties: Fake Estates, "Jamaica Curb," Block 10142, Lot 15, 1978Collaged gelatin silver prints, deed, and three maps
Reality Positions: Fake Estates, "Staten Island," Block 1224, Lot 12, 1978 Collaged gelatin silver prints, deed, and documents
“When I bought those properties at the New York City Auction the description of them that always excited me the most was ‘inaccessible.’ They were a group of fifteen micro-parcels of land. In Queens, left-over properties from an architects drawing. One or two of the prize ones were a foot strip down somebody’s driveway and a square foot of sidewalk. And the others were kerbstones and gutterspace. What I basically wanted to do was to designate spaces that wouldn’t be seen and certainly not occupied. Buying them was my own take on the strangeness of the existing property demarcation lines. Property is so all-pervasive/ Everyone’s notion of ownership is determined by the use factor.
A W-Hole House: Roof Top Atrium
1973Gelatin silver prints
A recreation of wall cuts from a room of A W-Hole House1973
in Genoa, Italy for the 2002 solo exhibition A W-Hole House
at David Zwirner, New York
Splitting
1974Collaged gelatin silver printsFramed: 41 x 31 inches (104.1 x 78.7 cm)
Documentation of Splitting1974
“So while this small not so happy house got cut and shifted
out of place, the action took only minutes of the building’s
history. Yet by my view all those pent-up lives respecting
the tiny cramped rooms were suddenly flooded with direct
sunlight.”
Installation view of Splitting: Four Corners1974
at the 2008 exhibition Cut: Revealing the Section at the San
Francisco Museum of Modern Art
Day's End (Pier 52)
1975
Chromogenic printSilver dye bleach print (Cibachrome)Silver dye bleach print (Cibachrome)
“During the afternoon the sun shines through a cat’s-eye-like ‘rose window’ in the west wall. At first a silver and then a strongly defined shape of light continues to wander into the wharf until the whole pier is fully illuminated at dusk. Below the rear ‘wall-hole’ is another larger quarter circular cut opening the floor of the south-west corner to a turbulent view of the Hudson water. The water and sun move constantly in the pier throughout the day in what I see as an indoor park.
Conical Intersect1975
Silver dye bleach print (Cibachrome)Collaged gelatin silver prints
Documentation of Conical Intersect 1975 in Paris
1977Silver dye bleach prints (Cibachrome)
Office Baroque
Documentation of Office Baroque 1977
in Antwerp, Belgium
Office Baroque1977
Building fragment: parquet wood flooring, drywall, and
wood; and silver dye bleach print
Circus Circus (Carribean Orange)
1977 1978
Silver dye bleach prints (Cibachrome)
Documentation of Circus (Carribean Orange)1978
at the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago
Sous-Sols de Paris: Les Halles
1977Chromogenic prints
Sous-Sols de Paris: Bones and Bottles
Sous-Sols de Paris: Basilica
“In fact, the next area that interests me is an expedition into the underground: a search for the forgotten spaces left buried under the city either as historical reserve or as surviving reminders of lost projects and fantasies, such as the famed Phantom Railroad. This activity would include mapping and breaking or digging into these lost foundations: working back into society from beneath. Although the original idea involved possible subversive arts, I am now more interested in the act of search and discovery. This activity should bring art out of the gallery and into sewers.”
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