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{{Short description|Conceptual artists group and movement}}{{About|the art group|the journal|Art-Language}} {{EngvarB|date=August 2014}}{{Use dmy dates|date=March 2019}}Art & Language is an English conceptual artists' collaboration that has undergone many changes since it was created around 1967. The group was founded by artists who shared a common desire to combine intellectual ideas and concerns with the creation of art, and included many Americans.From May 1969 the group published in England Art-Language The Journal of conceptual art.

History

File:Secret painting mel ramsden art language.jpg|thumb|Secret PaintingSecret PaintingFile:Art language mirror piece conceptual art.jpg|thumb|Mirror PieceMirror Piece(File:Art language air conditioning show conceptual contemporary art.jpg|thumb|Air conditioning show 1966-7)The Art & Language group was founded around 1967 in the United Kingdom by Terry Atkinson (b. 1939), David Bainbridge (b. 1941), Michael Baldwin (b. 1945) and Harold Hurrell (b. 1940).Neil Mulholland, The Cultural Devolution: art in Britain in the late twentieth century, Ashgate Publishing, Ltd., 2003, p165. {{ISBN|0-7546-0392-X}} The group was critical of what was considered mainstream modern art practices at the time. In their work conversations, they created gallery art and presented these ideas in a journal as part of their discussions.WEB, Art Term: Art & Language,weblink Tate Museum, 3 March 2023, The first issue of (Art-Language|Art-Language: The Journal of Conceptual Art) (Volume 1, Number 1) was published in May, 1969.WEB,weblink Art & Language, 21 May 2017,weblink" title="web.archive.org/web/20190123124657weblink">weblink 23 January 2019, dead, In 1972, the group created Index 01, consisting of 350 texts placed inside 8 filing cabinets. These texts were "indexed according to their logical and ideological (in)compatibility", to assert a "critical inquiry into art practice as an art activity in itself".JOURNAL, Morton, Tom, Art & Language: Musee d'Art Moderne Lille Metropole, France, Frieze, 4 April 2002, 66,weblink 3 March 2023, The Art & Language group that exhibited in the international Documenta 5 exhibitions of 1972 included Atkinson, Bainbridge, Baldwin, Hurrell, Pilkington, Rushton, and Joseph Kosuth, the American editor of Art-Language.BOOK,weblink Arte y archivo, 1920-2010: Genealogías, tipologías y discontinuidades, Guasch, Anna María, 2011-02-11, Ediciones AKAL, 9788446038146, es, The work consisted of a filing system of material published and circulated by Art & Language members.Anna Bentkowska-Kafel, Trish Cashen, Hazel Gardiner, Digital Visual Culture: Theory and Practice, Intellect Books, 2009, p104. {{ISBN|1-84150-248-0}}

Projects

Ian Burn and Mel Ramsden co-founded The Society for Theoretical Art and Analysis in New York in the late 1960s. They joined Art & Language in 1970–71.NEWS,weblink Des mondes à penser pour les crocodiles soumis, 2002-04-30, 2019-08-13, fr, During this time, Sarah Charlesworth and Christine Kozlov became affiliated with the group. New York Art & Language became fragmented after 1975 because of disagreements concerning principles of collaboration.Charles Green, The Third Hand: Collaboration in Art from Conceptualism to Postmodernism, UNSW Press, 2001, p48. {{ISBN|0-86840-588-4}}File:Art & Language, Untitled Painting (1965), Tate Modern, London - 20130627.jpg|thumb|Art & Language, Untitled Painting 1965. The Tate Modern Collection.]] In the early years of the 1970s, several artists joined the collective, including Ian Burn, Michael Corris, Charles Harrison, Preston Heller, Joseph Kosuth, Andrew Menard, Mel Ramsden and Terry Smith, and David Rushton. During this time the group produced numerous theoretical writings and art works.During the mid-1970s the group was in conflict during a time when conceptual art had lost some of its "critical bearing" and was being institutionalized. The conflicts among the collective existed within the context of global socio-political turmoil and economic crisis as well as the "revival of modernism."WEB,weblink Art & Language: Illustrations for Art-Language, September 2017, Centre de Création Contemporaine Oliver Debré, 3 March 2023, By the end of the decade, the only members who remained were Baldwin, Harrison and Ramsden, with the occasional participation of Mayo Thompson and the group Red Krayola with whom several recordings were made.WEB, Art & Language, Britain, UBUWEB:Historical,weblink Originally published in Aspen 8, 3 March 2023, BOOK,weblink Rough Trade, Young, Rob, 2006, Black Dog Publishing, 9781904772477, en, Ian Burn returned to Australia, joining Ian Milliss, a conceptual artist who had begun work with trade unions in the early 1970s, in becoming active in Union Media Services, a design studio for social and community initiatives and the development of trade unions.WEB,weblink Annecdotes about Anonymity by Ian Milliss, joaap.org, 2019-08-13, WEB,weblink Peripheral Visions: The Working Life of Ian Burn, Baumflek, David, July 2013, The Ivory Tower, In 1986, Art & Language was nominated for the Turner Prize.WEB, Turner Prize 1986: Gilbert & George won the Turner Prize (Art & Language listed among the nominees),weblink Tate Britain, 3 March 2023, (File:Art & language documenta 5 index 01.jpg|thumb|Art & language documenta 5 index 01)Art & Language and the Jackson Pollock Bar collaborated for the first time in January 1995,WEB, Jackson Pollock Bar,weblink ZKM: Center for art and media Karlsruhe, 3 March 2023, during the "Art & Language & Luhmann" symposium, organized by the Contemporary Social Considerations Institute (Institut für Sozial Gegenwartsfragen) of Freiburg.BOOK, ((Institut für soziale Gegenwartsfragen, Freiburg i. Br., Kunstraum Wien (Hg.) )), Art & Language & Luhmann III, 1997, Passagen Verlag, Wien,weblink 3 March 2023, The 3-day symposium included speakers such as Catherine David, who prepared the Documenta X, and Peter Weibel, artist and curator. There was also a theoretical installation of an Art & Language text produced in playback by the Jackson Pollock Bar. The installation was interpreted by five German actors playing the roles of Jack Tworkow, Philip Guston, Harold Rosenberg, Robert Motherwell and Ad Reinhardt.BOOK,weblink Conceptual Art and Painting: Further Essays on Art & Language, Harrison, Charles, 2003-08-08, MIT Press, 9780262582407, en, WEB,weblink Jackson Pollock Bar {{!, ZKM|website=zkm.de|language=en|access-date=2019-08-13}}WEB,weblink Art & Language en práctica, Fundació Antoni Tàpies, es-ES, 2019-08-13, An archive of papers relating to "New York Art & Language" are held at the Getty Research Institute, Los Angeles.WEB, Michael Corris papers of the Art & Language New York Group, 1965–2002, Papers and works relating to "New York Art & Language" are held at the Getty Research Institute, Los Angeles., Getty Research Institute Library Archives,weblink 4 March 2023,

Critical reception

In 1999, Art & Language exhibited at PS1 MoMA in New York, with a major installation entitled The Artist Out of Work. This was a recollection of Art & Language's dialogical and other practices, curated by Michael Corris and Neil Powell.WEB, The Artist Out of Work: Art & Language 1972–1981,weblink Museum of Modern Art, 3 March 2023, In a negative appraisal of the exhibition, art critic Jerry Saltz wrote, "A quarter century ago, 'Art & Language' forged an important link in the genealogy of conceptual art, but next efforts have been so self-sufficient and obscure that their work is now virtually irrelevant."Jerry Saltz, Seeing out loud: the Voice art columns, fall 1998-winter 2003, Geoffrey Young, 2003, p293. {{ISBN|1-930589-17-4}}In 2002, Beatriz Herráez, writing for Flash Art, described the Art & Language retrospective exhibition, Too Dark to Read, as "declaration meant to ‘clarify’ the group’s practice" as a method that is located in "the discursive quality of its ideational system and never in isolated works."JOURNAL, Herráez, Beatriz, Art & Language, Flash Art, December 2016,weblink 7 March 2023, Adrian Searle wrote in 2014: "Art & Language is as much as anything a conversation from which work arises and goes off on its own tangent, referencing itself, dragging Art & Language’s compendious history with it as it goes. Their's is an art that makes and unmakes itself, eats and regurgitates itself."NEWS, Searle, Adrian, A life measured in tea towels: Jonathan Monk and the art that freezes time,weblink 10 March 2023, 18 November 2014,

Members and associates

Members and associates include Terry Atkinson, David Bainbridge, Michael Baldwin, Kathryn Bigelow,Nicolas Rapold, "Interview: Kathryn Bigelow Goes Where the Action Is," The Village Voice, 23 June 2009. weblink {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100222050230weblink |date=22 February 2010 }} Access date: 27 June 2009. Ian Burn, Sarah CharlesworthWEB, Robinson, Christine, Sara Charlesworth: Image Language,weblink Printed Matter, 3 March 2023, ,Charles Harrison, Michael Corris,Preston Heller, Graham Howard,WEB, Art-Language, 1971,weblink National Gallery of Victoria, 3 March 2023, Harold Hurrell,Joseph Kosuth, Christine Kozlov,WEB, Christine Kozlov,weblink Aldrich Museum, 3 March 2023, Nigel Lendon,JOURNAL, Lewis, Ruark, Nigel Lendon 1944-2021, Artlink Magazine, 15 December 2021,weblink 3 March 2023, Andrew Menard, Philip Pilkington,WEB, Art & Language (Michael Baldwin, born 1945; Philip Pilkington, born 1949),weblink Tate Museum, 3 March 2023, Neil Powell, Mel Ramsden, David Rushton,WEB, David Rushton / Art As Conceit,weblink Talbot Rice Gallery, University of Edinburgh, 3 March 2023, Terry Smith, and Mayo Thompson and Red Crayola.

Public collections

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• Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia.WEB, Secret Painting 1967-1968, Art & Language,weblink Art Gallery of New South Wales, 4 March 2023,
• Arts Council of Great Britain, United Kingdom.WEB, Art & Language,weblink British Council, Visual Arts, 6 March 2023,
• Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris.WEB, Art & Language Homes from Homes 1 2000 - 2001,weblink Centre Pompidou, 4 March 2023,
• Centro de Arte Contemporàneo de Malaga, Malaga, Spain.WEB, Centro de Arte Contemporáneo de Málaga. (Málaga Centre for Contemporary Art),weblink Visit Malaga, 6 March 2023,
• Château de Montsoreau-Museum of Contemporary Art, Montsoreau, France.WEB, The Château de Montsoreau-Museum of contemporary art, Loire Valley,weblink Chateau de Montsoreau, 6 March 2023,
• FRAC Haute Normandie, Sotteville-lès-Rouen, France.WEB, FRAC Normandie Rouen: Collected Artists,weblink ArtFacts, 6 March 2023,
• FRAC Languedoc Roussillon, Montpellier, France.WEB, ART & LANGUAGE (Michaël BALDWIN et Terry ATKINSON),weblink FRAC Languedoc-Roussillon, Acquisitions 2014, 6 March 2023,
• Les Abattoirs, Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, Toulouse, France.WEB, Art & Language,weblink Les Abattoirs Musée - FRAC Occitainie Toulouse, 6 March 2023,
• Lille Métropole Museum of Modern, Contemporary and Outsider Art, Villeneuve d'Ascq, France.WEB, ART & LANGUAGE Sighs Trapped by Liars 1-192 (Soupirs piégés par des menteurs 1-192) 1996 - 1997,weblink Lille Métropole Museum of Modern, Contemporary and Outsider Art, 6 March 2023,
• Barcelona Museum of Contemporary Art, Barcelona Spain.WEB,weblink Un tresor al Macba - 30 març 2011, Maria, Palau, El Punt Avui,
• MAMCO, Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, Geneva, Switzerland.]WEB, Collection Catalog: Art & Language,weblink Migros Museum of Contemporary Art, 6 March 2023,
• Migros Museum of Contemporary Art, Zurich, Switzerland.WEB, Art & Language: Homes from Homes II,weblink Migros Museum of Contemporary Art, 6 March 2023,
• Musée d'art moderne, Saint-Priest-en-Jarez, France.WEB, Vingt-Quartre Heures de la Vie D'Une Femme: Collections du MAMC,weblink Musée D'Art Moderne Et Contemporain, 6 March 2023,
• Museum Moderner Kunst Stiftung, Vienna, Austria.WEB, Art & Language,weblink Museum Moderner Kunst Stiftung, 6 March 2023,
• Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, CA, USA.WEB, Art & Language,weblink Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles,
• Museum of Modern Art, New York.WEB, Art & Language: Corrected Slogans 1976,weblink Museum of Modern Art, New York, 6 March 2023,
• National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne, Australia.WEB, Art & Language: F works,weblink National Gallery of Victoria, 6 March 2023,
• Stedelijk Museum voor Actuele Kunst, Ghent, Belgium.WEB, Picasso's Guernica in the Style of Jackson Pollock Art & Language,weblink Stedelijk Museum voor Actuele Kunst, 6 March 2023,
• Tate Modern, London.WEB,weblink Art & Language (Michael Baldwin, born 1945; Mel Ramsden, born 1944), Tate, Tate,

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References

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External links

• Interview with Michael Baldwin and Mel Ramsden about Art & Language (2011) MP3
• weblink" title="web.archive.org/web/20060420080300weblink">Art & Language: Blurting in A & L online Hypertext version of a complete print work of 1973 by American members of Art & Language, with articles and a discussion forum.

Further reading

• Bailey, Robert. Art & Language International, Duke University Press, {{ISBN|9780822374121}}
• Thomas Dreher: Intermedia Art: Konzeptuelle Kunst with four German articles on Art & Language and a chronology with illustrated works.
• Morton,Tom. weblink" title="web.archive.org/web/20090922233350weblink">Art & Language, Frieze, April 2002.
• El análisis crítico de la modernidad de Art & Language

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