George Brecht
Closed on Mondays
New York City, USA: Fluxus, 1969
10 x 12 x 1.6 cm. (sizes varied)
Edition size unknown
An opaque plastic Canal street box contains adhesive material to secure itself permanently shut (it can only be opened very slightly). A black and white image designed by George Maciunas (see his mechanical for the layout, above) is adhered to the lid in which five children gather in front of two large double doors, with two of them doodling on the ground. The title appears as part of the graffiti on the doors, “Closed on Mondays, A Fluxgame, by George Brecht.”
Brecht's original prototype (above, bottom) was a wooden box held closed with a rubber band.
The idea comes from seeing signs in restaurant windows (Ferme le lundi), but functions just as well as a comment on the inaccessibility of art on Mondays (when many galleries are closed). The work also sits along other Fluxus kits which comment on their own opening and closing, such as Ken Friedman's Open and Shut Case.
"I made a box in Villenfranche - it had a rubber band inside. And then George came with this other thing using rubber cement and he had this photo made. That's more or less his recreation of the original model [which] has a little plastic sign on it with engraved white letters."
- George Brecht, 1983
