Bruce Nauman

Published in conjunction with the exhibition at Pirelli HangarBicocca in Milan, this monograph presents the most up-to-date compilation of the spatial and architectural works of New Mexico–based artist Bruce Nauman (born 1941). Through his neons, corridors and room installations, Nauman accentuates the contrast between the perceptual and physical experience of space. Perception itself can be interpreted as the subject matter of his work; the aesthetic experience of entering a narrow corridor or an empty room flooded with neon light supersedes the art “objects” in the viewer’s experience.
The volume includes newly commissioned essays on Nauman's conceptual developments and formal variations by scholars, conservators and curators such as Joan Simon, Francesca Esmay and Gloria Sutton, and a text by the exhibition curators. Alongside rich photographic documentation of the show, the publication also features entries for the 30 works on display written by researchers from international institutions.

“Contrapposto” refers to a pose in which the human subject is turned slightly so that the bust is positioned off-axis from the lower body. American artist Bruce Nauman (born 1941) explores this ancient artistic concept with his most recent project, in which he revisits his 1968 video piece Walk with Contrapposto that depicts the artist’s attempt to hold the classic pose as he walks down a narrow corridor. Nauman uses today’s digital manipulation technologies to build upon this early work in an entirely new context, questioning the representation of human movement and human stillness throughout history. This volume, designed by London-based graphics studio Zak Group, presents documentation of Nauman’s Contrapposto series from 2015 to 2019 as well as the original video, with new essays that extrapolate upon Nauman’s use of space and performance throughout his career.

Bruce Nauman: A Contemporary presents the artist (born 1941) as contemporary in a double sense. First, the works of Nauman’s 50-plus-year career are placed in the context of contemporary positions and discourses. Second, the publication analyzes the extent to which Nauman’s themes, media and forms have forged connections to the present, remaining of enduring importance for artists of subsequent generations.

This publication seeks to counter the tendency to cast Bruce Nauman as an outstanding, solitary figure of postmodernism by putting the artist’s work back in context. Nauman’s early works were originally discussed in the context of contemporary practices and discourses, such as minimal music, postmodern dance, conceptual art, Gestalt therapy or the philosophy of language. But soon Nauman’s reputation came to precede him, and his more recent work has largely been appraised independently of any artistic, social, historical or theoretical context. Critical consideration of Nauman’s work has narrowed to a relatively small selection of the artist’s works and ideas.

Bruce Nauman: A Contemporary redresses this imbalance by focusing on thematic concerns shared by Nauman and his contemporaries. Scholarly essays explore how Nauman and his works enter contemporary conversations on the relationship of art and work, art and globalization, and corporeality in the digital age.

At 76 years old, Bruce Nauman is widely acknowledged as a central figure in contemporary art whose stringent questioning of values such as good and bad remains urgent today. Throughout his 50-year career, he has explored how mutable experiences of time, space, sound, movement and language provide an insecure foundation for our understanding of our place in the world.

This richly illustrated catalog offers a comprehensive view of Nauman’s work in all mediums, spanning drawings across the decades; early fiberglass sculptures; sound environments; architecturally scaled, participatory constructions; rhythmically blinking neons; and the most recent 3D video that harks back to one of his earliest performances. A wide range of authors—curators, artists and historians of art, architecture and film—focus on topics that have been largely neglected, such as the architectural models that posit real or imaginary sites as models for ethical inquiry and mechanisms of control. An introductory essay explores Nauman’s many acts of disappearance, withdrawal and deflection as central formal and intellectual concerns. The 18 other contributions discuss individual objects or themes that persist throughout the artist’s career, including the first extensive essay on Nauman as a photographer and the first detailed treatment on the role of color in his work. A narrative exhibition history traces his reception, and features a number of rare or previously unpublished images.

Bruce Nauman was born in Indiana in 1941 and raised near Milwaukee, Wisconsin. He studied math, music and physics at the University of Wisconsin–Madison before switching his major to visual art, and received an MA in sculpture from the University of California, Davis, in 1966. In 1979 he moved to New Mexico, where he continues to reside. Nauman’s work has been the subject of two previous retrospectives, in 1972 and 1994. In 2009 he represented the United States at the Venice Biennale, where he won the Golden Lion.

Thomas Beard is Co-Founder of Light Industry, a venue for film and electronic art in Brooklyn and Programmer at Large for the Film Society of Lincoln Center.

Briony Fer is Professor of the History of Art at University College London and a Fellow of the British Academy.

Isabel Friedli is Curator and Head of Publications at the Schaulager, Basel.

Nicolás Guagnini is a New York-based artist.

Kathy Halbreich is the Laurenz Foundation Curator and former Associate Director at the Museum of Modern Art, New York.

Rachel Harrison is an artist who lives and works in Brooklyn.

Ute Holl is Professor of Media Studies at the University of Basel. Her research focuses on the nexus of cinema, perception, and knowledge.

Suzanne Hudson is Associate Professor of Art History and Fine Arts at the University of Southern California.

Julia Keller is Curatorial Assistant at Schaulager Basel.

Liz Kotz is an Associate Professor in the Department of the History of Art at University of California, Riverside.

Ralph Lemon is a choreographer, writer and visual artist based in New York. His recent exhibitions include Bibelots, at Bortolami, New York in 2017, and Union Gaucha Productions (with Karin Schneider) at Artists Space, New York.

Glenn Ligon is an artist based in New York. A mid-career retrospective of his work was organized by the Whitney Museum of American Art in 2011.

Catherine Lord is a writer, artist, curator and Professor Emerita of Art at the University of California, Irvine.

Roxana Marcoci is Senior Curator in the Department of Photography at the Museum of Modern Art, New York.

Magnus Schaefer is Assistant Curator in the Department of Drawings and Prints at the Museum of Modern Art, New York.

Felicity Scott is Associate Professor of Architecture and Co-director of the Critical, Curatorial and Conceptual Practices in Architecture program at Columbia University.

Martina Venanzoni is a member of the research and editorial team at Schaulager Basel.

Taylor Walsh is Curatorial Assistant in the Department of Drawings and Prints at the Museum of Modern Art, New York.

Jeffrey Weiss is Senior Curator at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, where he codirected the Panza Collection Initiative.

Since the late 1960s, Bruce Nauman (born 1941) has developed an astounding body of work combining sculpture, video, neon, installation and performance art. Nauman explores the body and identity, the function of language, the perception of space and the participation of spectators. He is also particularly interested in the world of dance; influenced by his encounter with John Cage and Merce Cunningham, in 1967 he began producing a series of filmed performances in which banal, everyday gestures or simple phrases are repeated methodically. In the 1970s and 1980s, he used neon in his works, playing with words or representing sexual scenes. Nauman’s more recent pieces continue to question the ideas or concepts he has explored since the beginning of his career, adding to an exceptionally rich body of work.
Designed in close collaboration with the artist, and published for an exhibition at the Fondation Cartier, Bruce Nauman presents photographs, notes, and sketches alongside excellent reproductions of art, all from the last four years, that allow the reader to gain a deeper understanding of a work that mines a terrain between conceptual and minimalist art.