[Papo Colo & Jeanette Ingberman, Editors]
Illegal America
New York City, USA; Exit Art, 1982
[27], 28 x 21.5 cm., boxed loose leaves
Edition size unknown
Artists Papo Colo and Jeanette Ingberman founded Exit Art in 1982 as a space for “unusual” art. A few months prior, they curated an exhibition at Franklin Furnace on the theme of art that had run afoul of the law. The works ranged from so-called desecrations of the American flag to Charlotte Moorman playing the cello topless to Chris Burden having his assistant shoot him in the arm with a rifle to the occupation of abandoned buildings by the Real Estate Show.
The catalogue consists of 27 folded sheets in a brown cardboard box, mostly artists' statements and documentation. The box is sealed shut with an American dollar bill. To open it you had to slice through the bill, itself an illegal act. (A 1948 law states that "Whoever mutilates, cuts, defaces, disfigures, or perforates, or unites or cements together, or does any other thing to any bank bill, draft, note, or other evidence of debt issued by any national banking association, or Federal Reserve bank, or the Federal Reserve System, with intent to render such bank bill, draft, note, or other evidence of debt unfit to be reissued, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than six months, or both.")
The catalogue features contributions byVito Acconci, Gempei Akasegawa, Louis Aragon, Scott Billingsley, Marc Blane, Gunther Brus, Barry Bryant, Chris Burden, Papo Colo, Bogomir Ecker, William Farley, John Fekner, Lou Forgione, John Giorno, GAAG, John Halpern, Abbie Hoffman, Sam Hsieh, Jay Jaroslov, Komar & Melamid, George Maciunas, Gordon Matta Clark, Ann Messner, Richard Mock, Peter Monnig, Charlotte Moorman, Otto Muehl, Hermann Nitsch, Dennis Oppenheim, People's Flag Show, Jan Van Ray and Real Estate Show.
Responding to the social and political climate of the time, the curators re-staged the exhibition eight years later, in 1990.
"The only disappointment to the show was that of the 36 artists and groups featured, though only for women artists. More unfortunate was that two of the women artists featured – Charlotte Moorman and Carolee Schneerman – figured as signifiers of transgressive sexuality. Undoubtedly, it is the political task of women artists to address issues of the body and sexuality, but retaining half of the female participants primarily in the realm of sexuality – and two other pieces by women dealt with animal rights and stealing – problematically reiterates already existing social patterns of sexual inequality.
Regardless of this inequality, this show was an important and voluminous one; the strongest work seems to be that which elicits the strongest reactions and forces public involvement. Like the flag in Dread Scott’s piece, which was alternatively taken off the floor and folded by those who believe in it as something to regard with total reverence, and then trampled upon by those who believe it is to be a more debatable symbol, strong work allows itself to go through whatever mutations are necessary to force an issue into the public arena.”
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