PEERS REVIEWED
To the Editor:
We appreciated the recent review by Scott Rothkopf of Diller + Scofidio at the Whitney Museum [Focus, Summer 2003]. It is one of the few that has dared to dispute the reverence with which their work is often considered. We’d like to lend our support to the dissenting voices involved in the debate.
—Pompei A.D., LLC
New York
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POSITIVE I.D.
To the Editor:
It was amazing to receive my new issue of Artforum and find on page 149 a photo of Stanley Goodman by Stephen Shore [Portfolio, May 2003]. It was more amazing that Mr. Goodman’s name was not even mentioned. Stanley Goodman was a modern-day Medici. He was chairman of the May Company in Saint Louis, president of the Saint Louis Symphony Society, the player of a Guarnius violin, and a recipient of the French Legion of Honor (visible in the photo) for all the work he did in promoting French fashion in the United States. I was fortunate to work for him as merchandise manager of women’s fashions from 1961 to 1967, when he was president of Famous-Barr in Saint Louis (a division of May Co.). In fact, he gave me the courage to become an artist later in life.
Stephen Shore knew what he was doing when he photographed Goodman. I imagine the title Saint Louis, Missouri, 5/31/75 was Shore’s way of saying that Stanley Goodman represented Saint Louis, Missouri. I do hope so.
—Arthur J. Krakower
Atherton, CA
Stephen Shore responds:
This photograph is indeed of Stanley Goodman. He commissioned me to make a portrait of him. When I went to title it for the Artforum portfolio, I found that my notes from the period were incomplete. I had the date of the photograph and remembered that it was in Saint Louis, but couldn’t recall Goodman’s name. I thank Mr. Krakower for refreshing my memory.
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KITCHEN STABLE
To the Editor:
Your fortieth-anniversary issues [March and April 2003] cover the 1980s in splendid detail. A master plan, it also serves as an open call for additions and reminiscences.
It is almost twenty-five years since Cindy Sherman’s “Untitled Film Stills,” 1977–80, were thumb-tacked up at the Kitchen, the multidisciplinary art and performance venue then on the corner of Broome and Wooster, where I was curator from 1978 to 1980. Almost twenty-five years since Robert Longo’s pencil drawing of a knight in armor was installed in the entrance hall, his wall reliefs in the gallery, and his performance Surrender, 1979, scheduled for the evening. Sherrie Levine’s slide projection President Profile, 1979; Jack Goldstein’s film loop The Jump, 1978, to be projected from floor to ceiling onto a brilliant red wall that matched the film’s background; Thomas Lawson’s paintings, Troy Brauntuch’s photos, and a wall installation by David Salle numbered among the venue’s varied performance, visual art, and video-viewing projects and events. While several of these artists were included in Douglas Crimp’s landmark 1977 exhibition “Pictures” at Artists Space, it should be noted that many of them received their first solo shows at the Kitchen.
More than a performance, video, and dance space, the Kitchen, located in the heart of late-’70s SoHo, was a launching pad for the first wave of ’80s visual artists. With its daytime exhibition hours and nightly programming, it was also a watering hole for a broad cross-generational, cross-disciplinary group: Sherman, Longo, Salle, William Wegman, Vito Acconci, Philip Glass, Bill T. Jones, Arnie Zane, Molissa Fenley, Laurie Anderson, Glenn Branca, Shigeko Kubota, Julia Hayward, Yvonne Rainer, Nam June Paik, Meredith Monk, Robert Wilson, John Lurie, Barbara Ess, Brian Eno, James Nares, and too many more to mention would stop by at all hours. In the back room stocked with folding chairs, speakers, and video monitors, one of the key themes of the ’80s—the swing between high and low—was discussed, as excerpts from The Gong Show, Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman, or tapes by Bill Viola, Gary Hill, and Kit Fitzgerald played in the background. “New Music New York,” a festival of new composers and their music under the direction of music curator and composer Rhys Chatham, hosted by the Kitchen in 1979, was a magnet for visual artists as well as those practicing other disciplines.
Alongside the Kitchen, BAM’s Next Wave Festival, P.S. 122, Pyramid Club, and artists such as Karen Finley, Spalding Gray, Eric Bogosian, and Ann Magnuson all contributed to the decade. Clearly, the history of performance is critical to an understanding of the 1980s overall.
—RoseLee Goldberg
New York
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ROCK OF AGES
To the Editor:
In Artforum’s anniversary-edition project “Writing the ’80s” [March and April 2003], no mention was made of Donald Kuspit, one of the most influential and passionate writers of that decade. Why the omission?
—Jeanne C. Fryer-Kohles
Worthington, OH
The editors respond:
We appreciate Ms. Fryer-Kohles’s inquiry and are happy to point out that Donald Kuspit’s influence is not limited to the 1980s. His first piece appeared in Artforum in January 1974, and the magazine continues to benefit from his engaged and discerning eye. In this issue, he contributes a review of Joel Shapiro’s latest exhibition.
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RELATIVE'S MERIT
To the Editor:
Recently, on a whim, I did a Google search on my uncle, Gene Swenson. One of the first hits was Artforum’s website. I took a chance and clicked. Scott Rothkopf’s piece [“Banned and Determined,” Summer 2002] was a wonderful glance at my uncle—his creativity and his very different mind-set. I have always known that he marched to a different drummer than the rest of his Topeka-rooted family. From a very early age, it was ingrained in me that he was the black sheep. Granted, I have very few memories of him, with the exception of a moment when he tried to sit next to me in my grandmother’s kitchen. I was terrified of him because of his wild beard and long hair. You must understand that my dad was a Marine—shorn short and clean-shaven. So the contrast at the time was frightening. And reading through his letters written to the Spencer Museum of Art in Lawrence, Kansas, I have been able to learn about his distrust of most “institutional” programs and mind-sets. My dad always told me he was special, but also that he was never able to understand him.
When I saw the picture of him on your website, it brought up many memories of my family. In fact, I pulled my two framed Ann Wilsons out of my closet and determined to put them up somewhere in my disorganized “thirtysomething” Tudor home. I thank you for this article and wish your publication well in the future.
—Susan Amy Swenson
Junction City, KS
