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Jack Goldstein

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Jack Goldstein
Born(1945-09-27)September 27, 1945
Montreal,Quebec,Canada
DiedMarch 14, 2003(2003-03-14)(aged 57)
San Bernardino, California,US
EducationChouinard Art Institute,California Institute of the Arts
Known forPerformance artist,Conceptual artist,Painter
Movementminimalist sculptureThe Pictures Generation

Jack Goldstein(September 27, 1945 – March 14, 2003) was a Canadian born, California and New York-basedperformanceandconceptualartist turnedpost-conceptualpainterin the 1980s.

Early life and education[edit]

Goldstein was born to aJewishfamily inMontreal,Quebec,[1]and moved as a boy to Los Angeles, California, where he attended high school in the 1960s and started taking an interest in learning about art. He received his training atChouinard Art Instituteand was a member of the inaugural class ofCalifornia Institute of the Arts,where he worked in post-studio art underJohn Baldessari,receiving an MFA in 1972.

Work[edit]

Aperformance artistwith roots inminimalist sculptureand aconceptual artistwho madeexperimental filmsand their audio equivalent onvinyl records,Goldstein divided his time betweenLos AngelesandNew York Cityduring the 1970s. While still a student at CalArts in 1972, he buried himself alive; with astethoscopeattached to his chest. He breathed air from plastic tubes while a red light above ground flashed to the rhythm of his beating heart.[2]

In the early 1970s asaudio artand video recordings became more accessible to the general public, Goldstein seized the opportunity and began producing his own art records. Among his records wereA Swim Against the Tide,A Faster Run(a recording of astampede),The Tornado,Two Wrestling CatsandThe Six Minute Drown.The Six Minute Drownin particular gained attention within the art world. In it, the dreary, agonizing sounds of a drowning man reverberate for six minutes.

Goldstein eventually became one of the linchpins of thePictures Group,which gained its first recognition atArtists SpaceinNew York Cityin the fall of 1977. During this time, he shared a studio building withJames Welling.[3]

The Pictures artists, including Goldstein,Robert LongoandTroy Brauntuchcame to the forefront of the early-1980s and flourished to varying degrees as the decade wore on. Goldstein began seriously to make paintings at this time. Eventually he became known for what he referred to as "salon paintings", designed both to be sold and secure for the artist a place inart history.Although he was accused by some of "selling out" to abull marketin painting, this tactic appropriated the art star mantle that Goldstein's work always has assumed.

Goldstein began to concentrate on painting in the late 1970s.[4]His paintings were based on photographic images of natural phenomena, science, and technology – the result of Goldstein's intent to record "the spectacular instant," as previously depicted in photography.[5]Many of them depict streakingfighter jets,lightning storms,exploding nebulae and city skylines illuminated by fireworks or bombing raids.[6]Using found photographs, and highlighting the reproduction or copy, Goldstein blew up details to near abstraction and then hired painters to apply them to canvases on boxlike stretchers that stand more than six inches off the wall. He was among the first contemporary painters to hire others to make his works.[7]

By the mid-’70s, Goldstein had stopped appearing in his films and performances and instead hired actors, stuntmen and light and sound technicians from the film industry.[8]His films include the well-knownMetro-Goldwyn Mayer(1975), a two-minute loop of the film studio’s roaring lion mascot on a blood red field, andShane(1975), named for the trainedGerman Shepherdthat barks in response to inaudible commands from someone behind the camera.[9]

Most of Goldstein's work revolved around the concept of experience, the concept of grappling with the conflation of experience and our recording of it. It asks whether documentation has become primary in our experience.

As the 1980s continued there was less and less call for his paintings and Goldstein's work sold less well than some others'. Reluctant to teach rather than practice full-time, Goldstein left New York in the early 1990s and returned to California where he lived out the decade in relative isolation.

His early work was revived at the turn of the century and he resurfaced briefly to some renewed acclaim. He was featured in the 2004Whitney Biennialas a major film influence alongsideStan Brakhage,less than a year after he committed suicide by hanging himself[10][11]in San Bernardino, California on March 14, 2003.

Goldstein may be remembered for a certainpost-conceptualrepresentational approach to painting that helped shape a generation of artists and beyond, even though they might not even be aware of him.

A posthumous documentary was made on Goldstein in 2014, titledJack Goldstein: Pictures and Sounds:ART/New York No. 67[12]

He has also been the subject of solo presentations atVenus Over Manhattan:Where is Jack Goldstein?in 2013 andJack Goldsteinin 2017.

Exhibitions[edit]

Goldstein compiled an extensive exhibition record during his productive years. Even after he stopped painting and moved back to Southern California, museums continued to exhibit his work. In 2002, a show of his films and performances was presented at theWhitney Museum of American Artin New York, and retrospectives were staged at theMaison de la culture de Grenoblein Grenoble, France, and the Luckman Gallery atCalifornia State University, Los Angeles.[13]A large-scale retrospective was originally scheduled for theMuseum of Contemporary Artin Los Angeles but was canceled in 2010 by its then-director,Jeffrey Deitch;it was instead shown at theOrange County Museum of Artand theJewish Museumin New York in 2013.[14]A new exhibit called "Disappearing" at theModern Art Museum of Fort Worthshowcased Goldstein's work (along with two other artists) in the summer of 2019.[15]

See also[edit]

References[edit]

  1. ^Balzer, David (10 September 2018)."Review: Jack Goldstein and Ron Terada".Canadian Art.
  2. ^Dorothy Spears (June 22, 2008),Death Can Be a Canny Career MoveNew York Times.
  3. ^Karen Rosenberg (May 16, 2013),An Artist With an Ever-Increasing Desire to Disappear: ‘Jack Goldstein x 10,000’ at the Jewish MuseumNew York Times.
  4. ^Suzanne Muchnic(March 20, 2003),Jack Goldstein, 57; Artist Explored EmptinessLos Angeles Times.
  5. ^"Art of the 80's: Goldstein".Collections of the Castellani Art Museum: Art of the 80's.Castellani Art Museum, Niagara University.Retrieved2008-03-30.
  6. ^Roberta Smith(March 19, 2003),Jack Goldstein, 57; Helped to Explore Post-Modernist ArtNew York Times.
  7. ^Martha Schwendener (September 12, 2014),The Process Behind the Painting: A Review of ‘Rothko to Richter: Mark-Making in Abstract Painting from the Collection of Preston H. Haskell’ in PrincetonNew York Times.
  8. ^Karen Rosenberg (May 16, 2013),An Artist With an Ever-Increasing Desire to Disappear: ‘Jack Goldstein x 10,000’ at the Jewish MuseumNew York Times.
  9. ^Karen Rosenberg (May 16, 2013),An Artist With an Ever-Increasing Desire to Disappear: ‘Jack Goldstein x 10,000’ at the Jewish MuseumNew York Times.
  10. ^Laurels Too Late,Hunter Drohojowska-Philp,Los Angeles Times,January 18, 2004
  11. ^HiLobrow (includes photo)
  12. ^"Jack Goldstein: Pictures and Sounds: ART/new york No. 67".artnewyork.org.Retrieved2018-12-20.
  13. ^Suzanne Muchnic(March 20, 2003),Jack Goldstein, 57; Artist Explored EmptinessLos Angeles Times.
  14. ^Karen Rosenberg (May 16, 2013),An Artist With an Ever-Increasing Desire to Disappear: ‘Jack Goldstein x 10,000’ at the Jewish MuseumNew York Times
  15. ^"Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth".Archived fromthe originalon 2019-05-13.

External links[edit]

Krygier, Irit audio interview with Philipp Kaiser regarding the exhibition Jack Goldstein x 10,000http:// conversationsonthearts /Philipp_Kaiser_Interview.mp3

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