_Open Work in Latin America, New York & Beyond_ and the Historic artwork _Citrus 6906_ by Hector Fuenmayor at Hunter College
“Open Work in Latin America, New York & Beyond: Conceptualism Reconsidered, 1967–1978”, curated by Harper Montgomery, Patricia Phelps de Cisneros Professor of Modern & Contemporary Latin American Art, and the historic installation “Citrus 6906” by Héctor Fuenmayor are on display at Hunter College.
Humberto Eco’s concept of the Open Work—an artwork that could not be completed without the viewer’s participation—was highly useful for Latin American conceptualists from the late 1960s through the late 1970s because it gave a name to the collaborative and corporal emphasis of their artworks. “ Open Work in Latin America, New York & Beyond: Conceptualism Reconsidered, 1967–1978” displays the capacious nature of conceptualism by exhibiting 91 books, video, sound works, prints, drawings, installations, and photographs by 36 artists working in Buenos Aires, Rio de Janeiro, New York, London, Los Angeles, Montevideo, and Caracas. Although not a historical survey, the show presents a collective desire to use the body to destabilize systems of representation shared by artists from Latin America working in conceptual modes from 1967 to 1978.
“Open Work in Latin America, New York and Beyond” includes some ninety works that have been generously lent to Hunter College from the Colección Patricia Phelps de Cisneros, The Museum of Modern Art, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Harvard University, Henrique Faria Fine Art, Document Art Gallery, Alexander Gray Associates, Daros Latinamerica Collection, Thria Collection, Luis Camnitzer, Jaime Davidovich, and Liliana Porter. The participant artist are: Diego Barboza, Artur Barrio, Luis Benedit, Mel Bochner, Donald Burgy, Luis Camnitzer, Sigfredo Chacón, Eduardo Costa, Jaime Davidovich, Iole de Freitas, Antonio Dias, Juan Downey, Felipe Ehrenberg, Rafael Ferrer, Anna Bella Geiger, Rubens Gerchman, Víctor Grippo, Leandro Katz, Joseph Kosuth, David Lamelas, Sol LeWitt, Lucy Lippard, Cildo Meireles, Ana Mendieta, Marta Minujín, Hélio Oiticica, Clemente Padín, Claudio Perna, John Perreault, Liliana Porter, Alejandro Puente, Carlos Rojas, Ed Ruscha, Bernardo Salcedo, Lawrence Weiner, and Horacio Zabala.
The historic work Citrus 6906 (originally Amarillo Sol K7YV68) (1973/2014 ) will be installed in the Bertha and Karl Leubsdorf Gallery until May 3. The conceptual and environmental work, now in the Colección Cisneros, was initially realized in 1973 for the artist's first solo exhibition at the Sala Mendoza in Caracas, Venezuela. Fuenmayor covered the entire exhibition space with industrial yellow paint: Amarillo Sol (Sunshine Yellow) K7YV68 in Caracas in 1973; Citrus 6909 at the Leubsdorf. The paint's commercial code forms the title of the work. Héctor Fuenmayor was born in Caracas in 1949, where he continues to live and work. He began his study of art at the Cristóbal Rojas School of Visual and Applied Arts in 1966, and had his first solo exhibition in 1973 in Caracas, where he showed regularly through the 1970s. Among his most important group exhibitions are the 5th Havana Biennial, in Cuba in 1994; Re-Aligning Vision at the Archer M. Huntington Art Gallery of the University of Texas, Austin in 1997; Jump Cuts: Venezuelan Contemporary Art at the Americas Society in New York in 2005 and at the CIFO Art Space, Cisneros Fontanals Art Foundation in Miami in 2007.
..................................................................
The Bertha and Karl Leubsdorf Art Gallery
CUNY Hunter College
