The Apartment
Projects
Bruce Conner.
Saturday, Sept. 12th, 6 to 8pm
The Apartment is very proud to present work by San Francisco beat trickster Bruce Conner, one of the most deliberately illusive and irreverent artists of our time. Conner’s expanded project continuously shifted through mediums and styles. This exhibition project offers a small glimpse at this protean artist’s conceptual universe.
A central figure in the Bay Area Beat movement, Conner was close friends and collaborators with Michael McClure, Wallace Berman, Dennis Hopper and Terry Riley. He first made a name for himself in the 1950s with assemblages of found objects, grotesque alters collaged with photographic traces of human experiences shrouded in shredded nylon stockings and costume jewelry, which he stopped making completely in 1957 for fear of becoming pinned down to a specific style. He then began creating short films. His virtuosic rapid fire editing and poetic cut-up had such a substantial influence they established him after only two films as one of the seminal figures of cinematic avant-garde. He again tried to squash this public acclaim by making the film “LEADER”, consisting solely of 35 mins of film tracking numbers. The film caused an enormous scandal and only solidified his reputation as a maverick. Through out the varied sculpture, visionary drawings, conceptual projects and valise, photography and collage there persisted an insistent voice questioning the mythic status of art, constantly experimenting to expand the field of artistic forms and meditating on mans endless pursuit for enlightenment. This snapshot of Conner includes 4 works from a short but fervent period, 1967–1970.
