Lebbeus Woods, Architect (2014)

“Acknowledging the parallels between society’s physical and psychological constructions, architect Lebbeus Woods has depicted a career-long narrative of how these constructions transform our being. Working mostly, but not exclusively, with pencil on paper, Woods has created an oeuvre of complex worlds—at times abstract and at times explicit—that present shifts, cycles, repetitions within the built environment. His timeless architecture is not in a particular style or in response to a singular moment in the field; rather, it offers an opportunity to consider how built forms impact the individual and the collective, and reflect contemporary political, social and ideological conditions, and how one person contributes to the development and mutation of the built world.

Lebbeus Woods, Architect brings together works from the past forty years by one of the most influential designers working in architecture. Beyond architects, he has been hailed by designers, filmmakers, writers, and artists as a significant voice in recent history, his works resonate across many disciplines for their conceptual depth, imaginative breadth, lasting beauty and ethical potency. The catalogue centers on transformation as a recurring theme, providing a framework for understanding the experimental nature of the work.”

The exhibition originated at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (Feb-Jun 2013) and was on view at the Eli and Edythe Broad Art Museum at Michigan State University (Nov 2013-Mar 2014) and The Drawing Center in New York City (Apr-Jun 2014).

With essays by curators Joseph Becker and Jennifer Dunlop Fletcher.

Publisher Drawing Center, New York, 2014
Drawing Papers series, 114
ISBN 9780942324846, 0942324846
129 pages
via publisher

Exhibition (SFMOMA)
Exhibition (Broad Museum)
Exhibition (Drawing Center)
Publisher
WorldCat

PDF (low res, 16 MB)
Issuu

Len Lye: Motion Sketch (2014)

“Len Lye’s career was marked by a lifelong fascination with movement and an aspiration to compose motion; the movement of the drawing hand was an important touchstone for his works in various media. In the 1920s, however, Lye began to make what he termed “motion sketches”; abstract drawings that attempted to render the movement of his subjects, rather than their appearance.

Motion Sketch reintroduces Lye’s multidimensional practice specifically in relation to drawing. Describing his drawing practice in his own carefree prose, Lye said that doodling “cultivates a vacuous seaweed-pod state of kelp as a skull which is attached to a pencil betwixt the arm and the fingers held doodling in turn ‘twixt you and the paper in a rather bemused, empty, harmonious state of an attitude, eyes periphering said paper.”

Lye’s kinesthetic approach to drawing—related to Surrealist automatism and anticipating aspects of Abstract Expressionism—also informed his practice in painting, photography, film and sculpture. Not limited to works on paper; the catalogue reveals how Lye’s concept of “doodling” underpinned his approach to much of his work. ”

Featuring a foreword by Brett Littman and essays by Gregory Burke, Tyler Cann, and Len Lye.

Publisher Drawing Center, New York, 2014
Drawing Papers series, 115
ISBN 9780942324853, 0942324854
97 pages
via publisher

Exhibition
Publisher
WorldCat

PDF (low res, 9 MB)
Issuu

Benjamin Patterson: Born in the State of FLUX/us (2012)

“Benjamin Patterson: Born in the State of FLUX/us is a retrospective of the artist’s career, which now spans nearly fifty years. The exhibition includes both early and recent work by the artist that range from annotated scores and books to painting and sculpture. Video documentation from performances and audio files of Patterson’s music will also be featured. As a founding member of Fluxus, a loose and international collective of artists who infused avant-garde practices of the day with humor and anarchic energy, Patterson helped revolutionize the artistic landscape at the advent of the 1960s and usher in an era of new and experimental music.”

With essays by Bertrand Clavez, Charles Gaines, Jon Hendricks, George E. Lewis, Fred Moten, Benjamin Patterson, and Marcia Reed; and chronology by Meredith Goldsmith.

Edited by Valerie Cassel Oliver
Publisher Contemporary Arts Museum, Houston, 2012.
ISBN 9781933619293, 1933619295
268 pages
via publisher

Publisher
WorldCat

PDF (51 MB, no OCR)
Issuu