Exhibiting the New Art: ‘Op Losse Schroeven’ and ‘When Attitudes Become Form’ 1969

Explore: ‘Op Losse Schroeven’ and ‘When Attitudes Become Form’ 1969

‘Op Losse Schroeven’ and ‘When Attitudes Become Form’ 1969

Introduction: Exhibiting the New Art

In 2001, reflecting on the making of the exhibition ‘When Attitudes Become Form’, the curator Harald Szeemann referred to the late 1960s as a revolutionary moment in art: ‘after the first revolution in visual arts at the beginning of the [twentieth] century it was the second revolution, and it is still the last revolution’.

Richard Serra in conversation with Lucy Steeds

US sculptor Richard Serra lived in Paris and Italy in the mid-1960s, before settling in New York. His first solo shows were at Galleria La Salita in Rome in 1966 and Galerie Ricke in Cologne in 1968.

‘Op Losse Schroeven’ and ‘When Attitudes Become Form’: Public Reception in the Netherlands and Switzerland

The media coverage of ‘Op Losse Schroeven’ started on an almost playful note on 14 March 1969, the day before the exhibition opened to the public, with a small news item broadcast on Dutch television.

Avant-garde Marketing: ‘When Attitudes Become Form’ and Philip Morris’s Sponsorship

Held at the Kunsthalle Bern in spring 1969, the exhibition ‘When Attitudes Become Form’ has often been presented as a turning point for the development of artistic and curatorial practices in the second half of the twentieth century.

Ger van Elk in conversation with Charles Esche and Steven ten Thije

Ger van Elk is a Dutch artist who first exhibited his work when based in Los Angeles in the early 1960s. In 1968, with his fellow countrymen Marinus Boezem and Jan Dibbets, he took part in ‘Junge Kunst aus Holland’ (‘Recent Art from Holland’), curated by Harald Szeemann for the Kunsthalle Bern prior to ‘When Attitudes Become Form’, and in the international festival ‘Arte Povera + Azioni Povere’ in Amalfi, Italy.

‘Op Losse Schroeven’ and ‘When Attitudes Become Form’ 1969

Op Losse Schroeven’ and ‘When Attitudes Become Form’ (Afterall Books 2010)

Jan Dibbets in conversation with Lucy Steeds

Jan Dibbets in conversation with Lucy Steeds

Marinus Boezem in conversation with Steven ten Thije

Marinus Boezem in conversation with Steven ten Thije

The Prodigal Maker’s Trilogy. Three Exhibitions: Bern, Amsterdam, Rotterdam

Anyone who visited the parallel exhibitions at the Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam and the Kunsthalle Bern ran slap – and literally, with works piled at his feet – into emergency situations. A museographic emergency: the disconcerting impact of organic materials, the intentions of the exhibitors and instruments adopted turned the museum into a transit store, especially and significantly in Bern.

Temporary Artistic Communities

Piero Gilardi in conversation with Francesco Manacorda