CHARLES SIMONDS
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CHARLES SIMONDS AND THE VERSATILITY OF CLAYThough no one in the Seventies would have described it as one of the lastpre-global decades-that could be said only retrospectively, when globalismhad set in-1 once heard Roy Lichtenstein ask whatever happened in theSeventies, as if it were a decade without interest, artistically speaking. I imaginehis question was based on the absence of a new movement in painting, likeAbstract Expressionism in the 1950s, or Pop in the 1960s. In truth there waswonderful painting being done in the Seventies, but not as part of a movement.There was little in the way of movements in the decade at all, barring the Patternand Decoration movement toward the end of the decade, or the emergence ofPerformance Art somewhat earlier. But it is difficult to mock a period w ith suchphotographers in it as Cindy Sherman, Nan Goldin and Robert Mapplethorpe,or the remarkable experimentations in sculpture by Eva Hesse (though she diedin 1970). Gordon Matta-Ciark, Robert Smithson, Richard Serra, Sol Lewitt andCharles Simonds. Again, their work did not gel into a movement-Simonds andMatta-Ciark, though friends, were poles apart as artists. But nothing like SpiralJetty, Serra's cast ingots, Matta-Ciark's cut houses, or Simonds' dwellings madeof small clay bricks, built, he claimed, for what he called "Little People;' hadantecedents in sculptural history. Formalism-Clement Greenberg's philosophy- remained the orthodoxy of museums and was indispensable for docents, butwhat was happening outside museums was immune to isms. That was thebenefit of the Sixties to young people who were eager to use art to addresssocial and political issues in fresh ways. An important exhibition of the Eightieswas called Making Their Mark: Women Artists Move into the Mainstream. Itsperiod was 1970 to the present. The large entry of women into the art world inthe Seventies, together with feminist critiques of painting, may have givenprominence to sculpture, and shaped the entire decade.Arabesque, 2011 , metal, polyurethane, plaster and clay,37 x 24 x 54 inches
This essay concerns the thought and art of Charles Simonds, born in NewYork in 1945 to parents, both of whom were psychoanalysts, who had fled fromVienna. He believes that his art is a small footnote to his mother's career, buthis thought, together with the art he has produced, has something of thesystematic character of a religion on one side and of philosophy on the other.What is striking is that clay is his medium, since clay had been, for the mostpart, a substance adopted by craftspersons for the production of figurines anddomestic vessels. But from the beginning, Simonds used clay as his primarymaterial, in the service of high art, having learned from the ceramicist JamesTracks. 1970. latex, 24 x 48 inchesMelchert that clay can be used to make anything, even a zipper. And theprimordial nature of the material is of ultimate significance in understandingSimonds' work.The Knoedler exhibition raises conceptual issues that touch on philosophyand science, and includes sculptures of objects rarely used as subjects, such astumbleweeds, fashioned out of porcelain into something exceptionallybeautiful-a dangerous term to use as an adjective which is more often anexpletive than a description.The Little People, whose artist Simonds became, had settled in a relativelysqualid part of lower Manhattan-an area of abandoned manufacturingbuildings that had been industrial-which encompassed the Lower East Side(from 14th to Houston Streets, between Avenues A and D), as well as the areathat was destined to become SoHo, the glamorous quarter of artists andboutiques that flourished in the Eighties. At the beginning of the Seventies, noone had yet imagined SoHo. Rather, the city's planners and politicians dreamedof expressways, a city made for automobiles. Their opponents believed itbelonged to people who grew up there. But no one thought it belonged toartists, other than the artists themselves, who found illegal lodging in lofts6where labor had been performed when New York was an industrial center.
- Page 2: CHARLES SIMONDSMENTAL EARTHGROWTHS
- Page 10 and 11: I asked Simonds if the distinguishi
- Page 13 and 14: visit him and discuss an exhibition
- Page 15 and 16: elongs with philosophy and religion
- Page 17: Mental Earth, 2002, metal, polyuret
- Page 20 and 21: material (material reality, meant p
- Page 22 and 23: was a part of Mental Earth. I asked
- Page 24 and 25: -.&~~~
- Page 27: 26 Two Streams. 2011. metal. polyur
- Page 31: 30 Grown Walls, 2011, wood, plaster
- Page 35: 34Tumbleweed, 1993, porcelain. 9 x
- Page 38 and 39: Structures: Linear, circular and sp
- Page 41 and 42: 40Gallery, Art Department, Los Ange
- Page 43 and 44: 42Kunstverein, Stuttgart, Germany.
- Page 45 and 46: 44Set and Situations, The Museum of
- Page 47 and 48: 46__ . "Charles Simonds: Le batisse
- Page 49 and 50: SELECTED PUBLIC COLLECTIONSLes Abat
- Page 51 and 52: September 10, 2011Dear Charles,You
<strong>CHARLES</strong> <strong>SIMONDS</strong> AND THE VERSATILITY OF CLAYThough no one in the Seventies would have described it as one of the lastpre-global decades-that could be said only retrospectively, when globalismhad set in-1 once heard Roy Lichtenstein ask whatever happened in theSeventies, as if it were a decade without interest, artistically speaking. I imaginehis question was based on the absence of a new movement in painting, likeAbstract Expressionism in the 1950s, or Pop in the 1960s. In truth there waswonderful painting being done in the Seventies, but not as part of a movement.There was little in the way of movements in the decade at all, barring the Patternand Decoration movement toward the end of the decade, or the emergence ofPerformance Art somewhat earlier. But it is difficult to mock a period w ith suchphotographers in it as Cindy Sherman, Nan Goldin and Robert Mapplethorpe,or the remarkable experimentations in sculpture by Eva Hesse (though she diedin 1970). Gordon Matta-Ciark, Robert Smithson, Richard Serra, Sol Lewitt andCharles Simonds. Again, their work did not gel into a movement-Simonds andMatta-Ciark, though friends, were poles apart as artists. But nothing like SpiralJetty, Serra's cast ingots, Matta-Ciark's cut houses, or Simonds' dwellings madeof small clay bricks, built, he claimed, for what he called "Little People;' hadantecedents in sculptural history. Formalism-Clement Greenberg's philosophy- remained the orthodoxy of museums and was indispensable for docents, butwhat was happening outside museums was immune to isms. That was thebenefit of the Sixties to young people who were eager to use art to addresssocial and political issues in fresh ways. An important exhibition of the Eightieswas called Making Their Mark: Women Artists Move into the Mainstream. Itsperiod was 1970 to the present. The large entry of women into the art world inthe Seventies, together with feminist critiques of painting, may have givenprominence to sculpture, and shaped the entire decade.Arabesque, 2011 , metal, polyurethane, plaster and clay,37 x 24 x 54 inches
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