For a Concrete Radicality: Henry Flynt Against the Avant-Garde

Authors

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.11606/issn.2178-0447.ars.2021.184218

Keywords:

Henry Flynt, Art and Politics, Experimental Music, Neo-Avant-Garde, Marxism

Abstract

Relegated to footnotes in the history of Fluxus and the post-Cage scene in New York, Henry Flynt developed from 1960 to 1966 a critical approach to the avant-garde from a revolutionary stance, looking for answers to questions which his peers apparently ignored. We work here with three texts which radicalized a critical discourse against the avant-garde, going from a formalistic critique to a total critique of Marxist and anti-colonial character. These three moments are presented in "rounds", one for each confrontation with the avant-garde, passing through its formal, social and political structures, in a route that goes from the abstract to the concrete and is manifested in a revolutionary praxis.

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Author Biographies

  • Bruno Trochmann, Pontifícia Universidade Católica de Campinas (Puc Campinas), Brazil

    Bruno Trochmann vive e trabalha em Campinas-SP, onde é professor adjunto da rede municipal de educação básica. Possui bacharelado e licenciatura em Artes Visuais pela Universidade Estadual de Campinas (UNICAMP) e mestrado no programa de Linguagens, Mídia e Artes da Pontificia Universidade Católica de Campinas. Atua nos circuitos de artes e música experimental, além publicar textos e traduções nas aréas de arte e política em diferentes meios.

  • Luisa Paraguai, Pontifícia Universidade Católica de Campinas (Puc Campinas), Brazil

    Luisa Paraguai é Pesquisadora e Docente permanente do Programa de Pós-Graduação em Linguagens, Mídia e Arte da Pontifícia Universidade Católica de Campinas. Vice-líder do Grupo de Pesquisa Produção e Pesquisa em Arte. Pesquisadora e artista nas interlocuções entre arte, design e tecnologia. Possui graduação em Engenharia Civil na Universidade de São Paulo (USP), mestrado e doutorado em Multimeios, no Instituto de Artes na Universidade Estadual de Campinas (UNICAMP), e pós-doutorado no Planetary Collegium, Nuova Accademia di Belle Arti NABA, Milão, e no MediaLab/BR, Universidade Federal de Goiás, Brasil.

References

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BURGER, Peter. Teoria da vanguarda. São Paulo: Ubu Editora, 1974.

FLEMING, Richard; DUCKWORTH, Willian (org.). Sound and Light: La Monte Young, Marian Zazeela. Nova Jersey: Bucknell Review, 1996.

GRUBBS, David. Records Ruin the Landscape: John Cage, the Sixties, and Sound recording. Durham: Duke University Press Books, 2014.

HAIDER, Asad. Armadilha da identidade: raça e classe nos dias de hoje. São Paulo: Veneta, 2019.

FLYNT, Henry. Essay: Concept Art. 1963. Disponível em: http://www.henryflynt.org/aesthetics/conart.html. Acesso em: jun. 2018

FLYNT, Henry. Communists Must Give Revolutionary Leadership in Culture. Nova Iorque: World View Publishers, 1965.

FLYNT, Henry. ART or BREND? 1968a. Disponível em: http://www.henryflynt.org/aesthetics/artbrend.html . Acesso em: jun. 2018.

FLYNT, Henry. Down with Art. 1968b. Disponível em: https://monoskop.org/images/0/0c/Flynt_Henry_Down_With_Art_1968.pdf. Acesso em: jun. 2018.

FLYNT, Henry. [Entrevista concedida a Robert Horvitz]. 1979. Disponível em: https://ubu.com/papers/Flynt-Henry_Interview_1979.pdf. Acesso em: 29 mar. 2021.

FLYNT, Henry. The Meaning of My Avant-Garde Hillbilly and Blues Music. [1982] 2002. Disponível em: http://www.henryflynt.org/aesthetics/meaning_of_my_music.htm. Acesso em: jun. 2018.

FLYNT, Henry. AGAINST “PARTICIPATION": A Total Critique of Culture. 1994. Disponível em: http://www.henryflynt.org/aesthetics/totcritcult.html. Acesso em: jun. 2018.

JOSEPH, Branden W. Beyond the Dream Syndicate: Tony Conrad and the Arts After Cage. Cambridge, MA: Zone Books; MIT, 2011.

LITWEILLER, John. The Freedom Principle: Jazz after 1958. Cambridge, MA: Da Capo Press, 1990.

MARX, Karl. A ideologia alemã. São Paulo: Editorial Boitempo, 1932.

PIEKUT, Benjamin. Experimentalism Otherwise: The New York Avant-Garde and its Limits. Los Angeles: University of California Press, 2011.

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Published

2021-11-29

Issue

Vol. 19 No. 42 (2021): Homeless Art Histories

Section

Public Call

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Copyright (c) 2021 Bruno Trochmann, Luisa Paraguai Donati

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How to Cite

For a Concrete Radicality: Henry Flynt Against the Avant-Garde. (2021). ARS, 19(42), 1034-1086. https://doi.org/10.11606/issn.2178-0447.ars.2021.184218