ZING MAGAZINE, A CURATORIAL CROSSING
CURATED SECTION, ISSUE NUMBER 25, 2018
Proposal, by Karin Bravin
In 1986 I was hired by the Peggy Guggenheim Collection to work for the Venice Biennale’s American Pavilion. One of the highlights of my time there, was a friendship that developed with James Lee Byars. He was a fixture in Venice and had the capacity to find beauty in even the most mundane aspects of the city. He often would draw my eye to small, quiet details most would overlook. Each time I saw him, he would urge me to approach the Guggenheim with his idea for a site-specific project; it was poetic and beautiful and would have transformed the experience of passing in front of the Peggy Guggenheim Collection while on The Grand Canal. Subsequently, and probably not coincidently, I have spent the last decade, working with artists on various site-specific installations and curating in the public realm. For my Zing project, I have asked 6 artists to envision their dream site -specific artwork. It didn’t need to be feasible- as long as they could render it with sketches, Photoshop, diagrams or text. While these particular projects may or may not come to fruition, the logistics and realization of an actual aesthetic intervention is an exciting process. Facilitating site-specific work that enables viewers to see and think about space and context differently than they have before is an artist’s greatest calling and challenge. The artists selected have all made extremely successful installations or projects in the public sphere, both indoors and outdoors. Thank you: William Corwin, Rachel B. Hayes, Fabian Marcaccio, Melissa McGill, Jason Middlebrook, Jean Shin and James Lee Byars.
