George Brecht

George Brecht
1964 portrait by George Maciunas
Born
George Ellis MacDiarmid [1]

(1926-08-27)August 27, 1926
New York, United States
DiedDecember 5, 2008(2008-12-05) (aged 82)
Cologne, Germany
NationalityAmerican
EducationUSP
New School for Social Research
Notable workWater Yam
MovementConceptual art
Fluxus

George Brecht (August 27, 1926 – December 5, 2008), born George Ellis MacDiarmid, was an American conceptual artist and avant-garde composer, as well as a professional chemist who worked as a consultant for companies including Pfizer, Johnson & Johnson, and Mobil Oil. He was a key member of, and influence on, Fluxus, the international group of avant-garde artists centred on George Maciunas, having been involved with the group from the first performances in Wiesbaden 1962 until Maciunas' death in 1978.

One of the originators of participatory art,[2] in which the artwork can only be experienced by the active involvement of the viewer, he is most famous for his Event Scores such as Drip Music 1962, and is widely seen as an important precursor to conceptual art.[3][4][5] He described his own art as a way of "ensuring that the details of everyday life, the random constellations of objects that surround us, stop going unnoticed."[6]

  1. ^ Cite error: The named reference Johnston was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  2. ^ George Brecht: Events, A Heterospective, Robinson, Walter König, p36
  3. ^ Independent Obituary
  4. ^ Brecht is the first artist mentioned in the text of Lucy Lippard's seminal history of Conceptual Art, Six years: the dematerialization of the art object from 1966 to 1972, and is referred to as 'Independently and in association with the fluxus group, Brecht has been making "events" that have anticipated a stricter "conceptual art" since around 1960.' Six Years, Lucy R Lippard, University of California Press, 1973, p11
  5. ^ Brecht used the term as early as 1957–58 in an essay Project in Multiple Dimensions; 'The primary function of my art seems to be an expression of maximum meaning with a minimal image, that is, the achievement of an art of multiple implications, through simple, even austere, means. This is accomplished, it seems to me, by making use of all available conceptual and material resources.' Quoted in Theories and Documents of Contemporary Art, K Stiles, P Selz, University of California Press, 1996 p333
  6. ^ Cite error: The named reference Obit was invoked but never defined (see the help page).

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