Farewell to Jimmie Durham, an artist who is a champion of rights
2021-11-17T21:32:05.872Z
"In my real life I am a poet," said Jimmie Durham. Indeed, everything in the multifaceted art of the great American performer who died today in Berlin, from the revolutionary sculptural constructions that made him famous to the battles for civil rights, is permeated with profound poetry. In 1985, he told in an interview with Domus in 2019, the year in which the Venice Biennale paid tribute to him with the Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement, the American Poetry Society had awarded his Columbus Day with 5 thousand dollars (1985 , West End Press, Albuquerque), for him, after so many years and so many awards, that remained the most important goal. "First of all, because I was recognized as a poet", he explained. "And then for the money, which allowed us to rest assured". Yet, in over sixty 'Years of a career spanning two continents, Durham has experimented with all the languages of art, working on the deconstruction of concepts and stereotypes typical of Western culture, using painting, sculpture, performance, drawing, sculpture, video. "A complete intellectual", Pierpaolo Forte remembers today, who met him at the Madre Museum in Naples of which he was president, "a man who spoke with matter, listened with an instinctive and faithful animism", an "indispensable" figure. Born in Arkansas and raised in Texas, Louisiana and Oklahoma, while his father was traveling in search of work, he began to make his way into the art world in the 1960s with theater, entertainment, literature.The first exhibitions in Austin in 1965 before moving to Switzerland to study at the École des Beaux-Arts. Then he returned to the USA, where he worked for the American Indian Movement, devoting himself passionately to the civil rights of Native Americans. In the 80s in New York he resumed his artistic activity focusing above all on the visual arts, without ever leaving poetry. And again Mexico and Europe, where he arrives in '94 and where he stops to live with Maria Thereza Alves, a partner in art and life, dividing his time between the two houses in Berlin and Naples. Many exhibitions of his works all over the world, from the Whitney Biennial to Documenta IX in Kassel, from the Institute of Contemporary Arts in London to the Museum of Modern Art in Antwerp, at the Palais des Beaux-Arts in Brussels,at the Kunstverein in Hamburg and Munich, the FRAC in Reims, the Serralves Foundation in Porto, the MAXXI in Rome, the MADRE in Naples, the Querini Stampalia Foundation in Venice, as well as at the Venice Biennale and the Gwangju Biennale. In 2017, the retrospective Jimmie Durham: At the Center of the World, curated by Anne Ellegood, opened at the Hammer Museum in Los Angeles and traveled to the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis, the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York City and the Remai Moderno in Saskatoon. And if the Biennale remembers him today "with affection and admiration", from the Madre, who in 2017 awarded him the Matron for Lifetime Achievement, comes the memory of the president of the Donnaregina Foundation Angela Tecce with the artistic director Kathryn Weir and all the staff who underline the "deep relationship"established with the museum, but also with the whole district; from Maxxi president Giovanna Melandri mourns her friend, "with her work A Proposal for a New International Genuflexion in Promotion of World Peace - he says - she has shown us how hope can break through the world through a gesture of peace". An artist but also much more, underlines next to her the artistic director Hou Hanru who, moved, greets him as "the wisest man in art, a fighter for love, freedom, humor, poetry, beauty and humanity ". Sick for some time, friends tell today, Durham worked until the end: "He scornfully refused his age and continued to live without prudence", smiles Forte. Greetings to Berlin, where he will be cremated.but also with the whole neighborhood; from Maxxi president Giovanna Melandri mourns her friend, "with her work A Proposal for a New International Genuflexion in Promotion of World Peace - he says - she has shown us how hope can break through the world through a gesture of peace". An artist but also much more, underlines next to her the artistic director Hou Hanru who, moved, greets him as "the wisest man in art, a fighter for love, freedom, humor, poetry, beauty and humanity ". Sick for some time, friends tell today, Durham worked until the end: "He scornfully refused his age and continued to live without prudence", smiles Forte. Greetings to Berlin, where he will be cremated.but also with the whole neighborhood; from Maxxi president Giovanna Melandri mourns her friend, "with her work A Proposal for a New International Genuflexion in Promotion of World Peace - he says - she has shown us how hope can break through the world through a gesture of peace". An artist but also much more, underlines next to her the artistic director Hou Hanru who, moved, greets him as "the wisest man in art, a fighter for love, freedom, humor, poetry, beauty and humanity ". Sick for some time, friends tell today, Durham worked until the end: "He scornfully refused his age and continued to live without prudence", smiles Forte. Greetings to Berlin, where he will be cremated.from Maxxi president Giovanna Melandri mourns her friend, "with her work A Proposal for a New International Genuflexion in Promotion of World Peace - he says - she has shown us how hope can break through the world through a gesture of peace". An artist but also much more, underlines next to her the artistic director Hou Hanru who, moved, greets him as "the wisest man in art, a fighter for love, freedom, humor, poetry, beauty and humanity ". Sick for some time, friends tell today, Durham worked until the end: "He scornfully refused his age and continued to live without prudence", smiles Forte. Greetings to Berlin, where he will be cremated.from Maxxi president Giovanna Melandri mourns her friend, "with her work A Proposal for a New International Genuflexion in Promotion of World Peace - he says - she has shown us how hope can break through the world through a gesture of peace". An artist but also much more, underlines next to her the artistic director Hou Hanru who, moved, greets him as "the wisest man in art, a fighter for love, freedom, humor, poetry, beauty and humanity ". Sick for some time, friends tell today, Durham worked until the end: "He scornfully refused his age and continued to live without prudence", smiles Forte. Greetings to Berlin, where he will be cremated.with his work A Proposal for a New International Genuflexion in Promotion of World Peace - he says - he showed us how hope can break into the world through a gesture of peace. "An artist but also much more, underlines the director next to her Hou Hanru who, moved, greets him as "the wisest man in art, a fighter for love, freedom, humor, poetry, beauty and humanity". friends tell today, Durham worked until the end: "He contemptuously refused his age and continued to live without prudence", smiles Forte. The greeting to Berlin, where he will be cremated.with his work A Proposal for a New International Genuflexion in Promotion of World Peace - he says - he showed us how hope can break into the world through a gesture of peace. "An artist but also much more, underlines the director next to her Hou Hanru who, moved, greets him as "the wisest man in art, a fighter for love, freedom, humor, poetry, beauty and humanity". friends tell today, Durham worked until the end: "He contemptuously refused his age and continued to live without prudence", smiles Forte. The greeting to Berlin, where he will be cremated.underlines next to her the artistic director Hou Hanru who, moved, greets him as "the wisest man in art, a fighter for love, freedom, humor, poetry, beauty and humanity ". Sick for some time, friends tell today, Durham worked until the end: "He scornfully refused his age and continued to live without prudence," smiles Forte. The greeting to Berlin, where he will be cremated.underlines next to her the artistic director Hou Hanru who, moved, greets him as "the wisest man in art, a fighter for love, freedom, humor, poetry, beauty and humanity ". Sick for some time, friends tell today, Durham worked until the end: "He scornfully refused his age and continued to live without prudence," smiles Forte. The greeting to Berlin, where he will be cremated.He scornfully refused his age and continued to live without prudence ", smiles Forte. The greeting to Berlin, where he will be cremated.He scornfully refused his age and continued to live without prudence ", smiles Forte. The greeting to Berlin, where he will be cremated.
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November 17, 2021 "In my real life I am a poet", said Jimmie Durham. Indeed, everything in the multifaceted art of the great American performer who died today in Berlin, from the revolutionary sculptural constructions that made him famous to the battles for civil rights, is permeated with profound poetry. In 1985, he told in an interview with Domus in 2019, the year in which the Venice Biennale paid tribute to him with the Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement, the American Poetry Society had awarded his Columbus Day with 5 thousand dollars (1985 , West End Press, Albuquerque), for him, after so many years and so many awards, that remained the most important goal.
"First of all, because I was recognized as a poet", he explained. "And then for the money, which allowed us to rest assured".
Yet, in over sixty years of a career spanning the two continents, Durham has experimented with all the languages of art, working on the deconstruction of concepts and stereotypes typical of Western culture, using painting, sculpture, performance, drawing, sculpture. , video. "A complete intellectual", Pierpaolo Forte remembers today, who met him at the Madre Museum in Naples of which he was president, "a man who spoke with matter, listened with an instinctive and faithful animism", an "indispensable" figure.
Born in Arkansas and raised in Texas, Louisiana and Oklahoma, while his father was traveling in search of work, he began to make his way into the art world in the 1960s with theater, entertainment, literature. The first exhibitions in Austin in 1965 before moving to Switzerland to study at the École des Beaux-Arts. Then he returned to the USA, where he worked for the American Indian Movement, devoting himself passionately to the civil rights of Native Americans.
In the 80s in New York he resumed his artistic activity focusing above all on the visual arts, without ever leaving poetry. And again Mexico and Europe, where he arrives in '94 and where he stops to live with Maria Thereza Alves, a partner in art and life, dividing his time between the two houses in Berlin and Naples.
Many exhibitions of his works all over the world, from the Whitney Biennial to Documenta IX in Kassel, from the Institute of Contemporary Arts in London to the Museum of Modern Art in Antwerp, at the Palais des Beaux-Arts in Brussels, at the Kunstverein in Hamburg. and Monaco, the FRAC in Reims, the Serralves Foundation in Porto, the MAXXI in Rome, the MADRE in Naples, the Querini Stampalia Foundation in Venice, as well as the Venice Biennale and the Gwangju Biennale. In 2017, the retrospective Jimmie Durham: At the Center of the World, curated by Anne Ellegood, opened at the Hammer Museum in Los Angeles and traveled to the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis, the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York City and the Remai Moderno in Saskatoon. And if the Biennale today remembers him "with affection and admiration", from Madre,who in 2017 awarded him the Matron for Lifetime Achievement, comes the memory of the president of the Donnaregina Foundation Angela Tecce with the artistic director Kathryn Weir and all the staff who underline the "profound relationship" established with the museum, but also with the whole neighborhood; from Maxxi president Giovanna Melandri mourns her friend, "with her work A Proposal for a New International Genuflexion in Promotion of World Peace - he says - she has shown us how hope can break through the world through a gesture of peace".from Maxxi president Giovanna Melandri mourns her friend, "with her work A Proposal for a New International Genuflexion in Promotion of World Peace - he says - she has shown us how hope can break through the world through a gesture of peace".from Maxxi president Giovanna Melandri mourns her friend, "with her work A Proposal for a New International Genuflexion in Promotion of World Peace - he says - she has shown us how hope can break through the world through a gesture of peace".
An artist but also much more, underlines next to her the artistic director Hou Hanru who, moved, greets him as "the wisest man in art, a fighter for love, freedom, humor, poetry, beauty and humanity ".
Sick for some time, friends tell today, Durham worked until the end: "He scornfully refused his age and continued to live without prudence," smiles Forte.
The greeting to Berlin, where he will be cremated.
