Assignment 2

Look at Allan McCollum’s work ‘Plaster Surrogates’ and explain its relationship to Modernist art and theory.

Created in the early 1980’s, ‘Plaster Surrogates’ is a series of works by L.A born artist Allan McCollum. Collections of what appear to be framed monochrome canvases are displayed in galleries in large groups with no picture being the same in terms of size or colour.

In Collection of 40 plaster surrogates, Mccollum has used black enamel for the picture and varying shades of grey/black for the frame. The title ‘plaster surrogates’ becomes self-explanatory when we realise that McCollum’s paintings aren’t actually paintings at all but rectangular plaster shapes cast in moulds of varying sizes in the shape of a picture and it’s frame. What we are viewing are ‘plaster surrogates’ or imitations of framed monochrome paintings mounted to a wall.

When ‘Plaster Surrogates’ is displayed in galleries, it is hung in various ways depending on the specifics of the gallery space. For example, it has been hung to resemble a 19th Century salon (Fig 1.), wrapped around wall space (Fig 2. ) or ordered in near horizontal or vertical lines (Fig 3.)

Shown in different ways, we start to pay an interest in what the ‘plaster surrogates’ are or represent. They are not specific objects and could be representative of anything placed in a frame – photo, painting, diploma etc. McCollum (2016) refers to them as ‘signs’ for paintings and that the viewer is looking at a ‘bigger picture’ of the social convention for hanging these collectible objects on our walls.

McCollum paints most of his imitation canvas’s in pure black enamel and by exploring this use of monochrome we can start to understand Plaster Surrogate’s relationship to Modernist art and theory. Clement Greenberg in his 1961 essay ‘Modernist Painting’ claimed that ‘the essence of modernism lies… in the use of the characteristic methods of a discipline to criticize the discipline itself…’ Each discipline of the arts needed to exhibit and make explicit ‘that which was unique and irreducible.’ (Greenberg 1960 2-3) In painting, this uniqueness or limiting conditions was found to be its optical flatness or two- dimensionality.

“The flat surface, the shape of the support, the properties of pigment – were treated by the Old Masters as negative factors, that could be acknowledged only implicitly or indirectly, Modernist painting has come to regard these same limitations as positive factors.” (Greenberg 1960, 2)

Traditional painting had endeavoured to create an illusion of three-dimensional representational space but Modernist art abandoned recognizable representation and became self-referential by drawing attention to the flatness of the canvas.

Greenberg was a strong advocate of abstract artists such as Pollock and Rothko who he believed were pure Modernist artists embracing the flat surface of the canvas. However, an emerging group of artists in the 1950’s and 60’s started to push Greenberg’s Modernsim to a logical extreme by producing pure monochrome canvases.

Robert Rauschenberg created a series of pure painted white panels in 1951, that were meant to look pure and untouched by human hands. As a precursor to minimalism and conceptualism, these panels act like reflective screens and require the viewer to observe life around the screens – particles of dust, changing light, shadows. Rauschenbergs screens were not pure but acted as a receptive surface of life and the culture around it. (Anderson, 2011)

Minimalist painter Frank Stella produced a series of monochrome 'Black Paintings' that were completely self-referential.

The Marriage of Reason and Squalor II (1959) consists of simple black bands that leave gaps of pure canvas. The stripes reference the rectangular shape of the canvas and when viewing we are looking purely at the painting as paint on a canvas and nothing else. Greenberg(1960) did not initially accept Stella's canvas's as modernist. He had stated that ' Modernism has found that these limiting conditions can be pushed back indefinitely before a picture stops being a picture and turns into an arbitrary object.' De Duve states that:

"Greenberg's taste stopped short of including Stella's black paintings. Is it because they transgressed this ultimate limit and became 'arbitrary objects'. But it would then mean that this limit could not 'be pushed back indefinitely' and that the history of Modernist painting might be terminated.' (De Duve, 1996:247)

According to Tate, monochromes are painted for either spiritual or formal reasons. Rauschenberg's white panels were painted for reflection and abstract purity yet Stella's 'Black Paintings' were reducing painting to its most simplest form focusing on the pure physical elements; colour, form and texture. We can see that McCollum has used black monochrome in Plaster Surrogates to achieve a particular effect (formal or spiritual), yet we still need to understand the development of modernist art to fully understand what this is.

Plaster Surrogates is neither a painting nor a sculpture, yet it appears to be both - a fusion of two disciplines. As previously discussed, in Modernism each discipline of the arts needed to exhibit and make explicit 'that which was unique and irreducible.' (Greenberg 1960 2-3) There was no overlapping between disciplines allowed in Modernism, each was separate and distinct. So how did this fusion of two disciplines become actualised? The Minimalist movement of the 1960's pushed back the limiting conditions of paintings so far that it started to move closer to the discipline of sculpture by moving into the 3rd dimension. Generic art was created.

In the piece titled 'Piano' by Richard Smith (Fig 6.) we are literally able to see this new hybrid art emerging. The art work is still on the wall yet seems to burst out from the canvas and onto the gallery floor. Further work by minimalists saw art completely leave the gallery wall and become freestanding painted sculptures. Artist Donald Judd wished to secure the legitimacy of this kind of art. According to de Duve (1996:268)'it is essential to Judd that Modernism should be allowed to progress beyond the limit set by the literal monochrome.' Eventually Greenberg accepted this new non-modernist hybrid of painting and sculpture which in turn opened new opportunities for artists creating interspecific art (including conceptual and performance). This seemed a natural progression for painting once modernism had reached and transgressed the monochrome.

So Plaster Surrogates has a direct relationship with Modernist art and theory. Firstly, McCollum has used a black monochrome on his 'surrogate' canvas and secondly, it is a hybrid of disciplines - a painting and a sculpture. Plaster Surrogates is not a modernist or a minimal piece of art but has its origins in both. McCollum could easily have used real monochrome framed canvases to create his art, but the fact that he has used mass produced objects invites us to look at the concept of his work.

McCollum describes his 'surrogates' as emblems or a sign for a painting/ picture.

"There is some parody, I think, in the way I reduce all paintings to a single “kind,” to a universal sign-for-a-painting; the gesture can be read as an ironic mimicry of modernist reduction, for instance, or as some kind of reference to the relations between modern art and modern industrial production." (McCollum 1985)

Unlike Greenberg, whose Modernist theory focused on purity of discipline, McCollum is more interested in the 'emotional' content that occurs between the viewer and the object/s. By creating an object resembling a painting with all content removed (monochrome), he is allowing the viewer to approach the work of art and experience expectations, emotions and desires. What transaction is taking place? McCollum (1985) states that the effect creates 'the experience of subjectivity rather than creating subjective experience.' He is inviting the viewer to question 'What kind of an object a painting is in an emotional sense and without the patriarchal noise of aesthetics intruding into the relationship.'

McCollum describes his 'plaster surrogates' as props, the gallery as a theatre and the spectators as actors. What are these rectangular shaped objects and why do we place them on our walls. (Traditionally in ancient and tribal art, painting was placed on the body, directly on the walls or embodied in architecture). A painting is a convention of our culture and we as individuals relate to that convention.

Plaster Surrogates has emerged from Modernist theory by exploiting the monochrome canvas and embracing the generic art of fused disciplines. McCollum rejects Greenberg's theory of Modernist Painting by deflecting self-awareness away from the painting and onto the spectator. It is what is happening around the Plaster Surrogates that is emphasised in this piece of art work rather than the art work itself.

Reflection

I felt as though I could write a lot more about this piece of art work and ended up omitting a lot of research. McCollum has a fascination with objects and the way humans interact with them. It would have been interesting to explore the manufacture of the Plaster surrogates and their relationship to the capitalist consumer society that we live in. . McCollum also has a perspective that looks at the ‘bigger picture’ and I find it fascinating that what initially seems like a simple piece of work can expand our understanding of life and ourselves.

List of Illustrations

Fig 1. McCollum, A. (1982) Collection of 40 Plaster Surrogates [ Enamel on cast Hydrostone] At https://www.pinterest.co.uk/pin/254031235202132677/?lp=true (Accessed 18/01/2020)

Fig 2. McCollum, A. (1982) Collection of 40 Plaster Surrogates [ Enamel on cast Hydrostone] Installation: Metro Pictures, New York, 1985-86 At http://allanmccollum.net/allanmcnyc/Dietmar_Elger.html (Accessed 11/01/2020)

Fig 3. McCollum, A. (1982) Collection of 40 Plaster Surrogates [ Enamel on cast Hydrostone] At http://www.artnet.com/artists/allan-mccollum/100-plaster-surrogates-YQRkUziinrA_pzOU2iMAtw2 (Accessed 11/01/2020)

Fig 4. Rauschenberg R. (1951) Three Panels At https://www.sfmoma.org/artwork/98.308.A-C/ (Accessed 12/01/2020)

Fig 5. Stella F. (1959) The Marriage of Reason and Squalor II  [enamel on canvas] At https://uk.phaidon.com/agenda/art/articles/2018/february/08/understanding-stella-the-black-paintings/ (Accessed 12/01/2020)

Fig 6. Smith R. (1963) Piano [pva paint on canvas] At https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/smith-piano-t02003 (Acessed 13/01/2020)

Fig 7. McCollum, A. (1982/3-5) Two Hunderd Plaster Surrogates [Enamel on cast Hydrostone] At https://www.themodern.org/tap/11214-day-4-randy-guthmiller (Accessed 15/01/2020)

Bibliography

Bois, Y.A et al (2004) Art Since 1900 London and New York, Thames and Hudson

Anderson, J (2012) [ARTS 315] The Fully Present Object: Minimalism. Contemporary art trends lecture series. Biola University, California 9/07/2012 At https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RogfryPVWDk (Accessed 15/01/2020)

Anderson, J (2012) [ARTS 315] Duchamp's Legacy: Robert Rauschenberg and John Cage. Contemporary art trends lecture series. Biola University, California. At https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TF-MuonISAk (Accessed 15/01/2020)

Dellinger, J. (2013), A Conversation with Allan McCollum: MASS-PRODUCING INDIVIDUAL WORKS in Sculpture; Washington  Vol 32 Iss 2., (Mar 2013): 44-49. At https://search-proquest-com.ucreative.idm.oclc.org/docview/1347528180?pq-origsite=summon (Accessed 15/01/2020)

De Duve, T. (1996) 'The Monochrome and the Blank canvas' in Guilbaut, S. (ed) Reconstructing Modernism’. MIT: Univers and Bodini pp.244-310 At https://monoskop.org/File:Guilbaut_Serge_ed_Reconstructing_Modernism_Art_in_New_York_Paris_and_Montreal_1945-1964.pdf Accessed 15/01/2020)

Greenberg, C. (1961) Modernist Painting At http://www.yorku.ca/yamlau/readings/greenberg_modernistPainting.pdf (Accessed 15/01/2020)

https://www.tate.org.uk/art/art-terms/m/monochrome (Accessed 15/01/2020)

Moma Learning, McCollum, A. (1982) Collection of Forty plaster Surrogates At https://www.moma.org/collection/works/79653 (Accessed 15/01/2020)

Moma Learning, Stella F. (1959) The Marriage of Reason and Squalor II  [enamel on canvas] At https://uk.phaidon.com/agenda/art/articles/2018/february/08/understanding-stella-the-black-paintings/ (Accessed 12/01/2020)

Robbins D. A. (1984) An Interview with Allan McCollum In Arts Magazine 1985 At http://web.mit.edu/allanmc/www/amcarticles/McCollum-Robbins.pdf (Accessed 15/01/2020

Starke, T. (2012) Allan McCollum originally published in:
This Will Have Been: Art, Love & Politics in the 1980s
At http://allanmccollum.net/allanmcnyc/McCollum-Starke.html (Accessed 15/01/2020)