Ray Johnson: Untitledcorrespondence from Bob Box Archive, 1988–95; mixed media; dimensions variable.From Esopus 16 (Spring 2011).
BERKELEY,CA.-
The University of California, BerkeleyArt Museum and Pacific Film Archive presents Tables of Content: Ray Johnson and Robert Warner Bob Box Archive/ MATRIX 241, an exhibition exploring the seven-year exchange of correspondence between legendaryartistRay Johnson (1927–95) and collagist RobertWarner.The presentation features the contents of thirteen cardboard boxes given toWarner by Johnson in 1990.
Warner, an opticianworking in New York City, first encountered Johnson’s work on a postcard sentby a mutual friend in 1988. Intrigued by the possibilitiesof corresponding with an artist, Warner initiated what evolved into an intense exchange between the two that continued untilJohnson’s death of an apparent suicide in 1995. Over the course of theirfriendship Warner received hundreds of pieces ofmail artfrom Johnson, ranging from collages to a piece of driftwood that washand-delivered. On one occasion, Johnson Xeroxed a copy of Declaration ofIndependence and requested that Warner have it signed by John Cage—which hedid. While they spoke on the phone nearly every day, Johnson and Warner met inperson only seven times. At one of their rare in-person meetings, Johnson gaveWarner thirteen cardboard boxes tied with twine, labeled “Bob Box 1,”“Bob Box 2,” and so on. Although never stated, the understanding was thatWarner would preserve the boxes.
Ray Johnson(1927-1995)
In June of this year, fifteen years after Johnson’s death, Warner unpacked the boxes one at a time and cataloged theircontentsin public view through the course of an exhibition at Esopus Space in New YorkCity. The opened “Bob Boxes” reveal an array of found objects,drawings, photocopies, and correspondence. Warner has described the contents as“a window into the world of Ray Johnson in the ‘70s and ‘80s:everything from signed-and-dated empty toilet paper tubes to a box thatcontained nothing but hundreds of envelopes that were addressedbut never mailed.
Table of Content catalog
Tables of Content displays all thirteen boxes and their contentsfor the first time on the West Coast. Warner has selected and arranged the letters,drawings, photocopies, and found objects like t-shirts, tennis balls, andrandom beach trash—the material ofJohnson’s art—on an assembly of thirteen tables and surrounding gallerywalls. Johnson annotated many of these things with personalcodes,puns, and dark, irreverent jokes. Johnson’s work—collages, correspondence art,and performance events—remains mysterious and a bit hard topin down.But his influences are obvious and surface repeatedly, among them Andy Warhol, Joseph Cornell, Rauschenberg, and Elvis Presley. His collage approachwas diaristic, a stream-of-consciousness flow through the matter and memory ofeveryday life, shifting from one topic to another, acrossall variety of things. Johnson once remarked, “My work is like driving acar. I’m always shifting gears.”
Ray Johnson in JosefAlbers' class at Black Mountain College 1945-48 , Photo by Hazel Larsen Archer.
NOTE:
Fascinating to come across this Ray Johnson announcement in asemi-dream state sometime earlier or later this semi-night-morning.
And as clever/strained exhibition titles go, Table of Content isn’tbad. (Long experience devising titlesfor presentations, as well as subtly – I like to think -- effective subjectlines for business letters, makes me sympathetic to titlers.)
The first thing I thought of – this must have been said before –is how strongly the mysterious Ray Johnson seems like a proto-blogger in hishermetic-in-plain-sight, serial, dreamy, collagist, diaristic work.
I have vivid Ray Johnson memories dating from my earliest days touringManhattan art galleries. My first personalencounter must have been when I workedat the Richard Feigen Gallery on Greene Street in the spring/summer of 1971,although I’m sure I saw him several years earlier at the Leo Castelli galleryand heard someone mention his name. Of course he was a regular presence throughpublished appearances (today we’d say postings) in the Village Voice. Later at the Whitney, a colleague of mine (astrange lonely woman) turned out to be a Johnson correspondent, would-be accompliceand acolyte.
Johnson and his art were both quietly insinuating, disconcertingpresences, impossible either to comfortably embrace or ignore. SO much art material, sheer volume, and yet teetering on the knife- edge of, almost defining, ephemera. You ask yourself: Modest proposal or a new sort of Grandachievement?
Now, to my surprise, I seem myself to inhabit a portion of that same dreamyworld.
The John Cale song, Hey Ray, linkedbelow isn’t very good, although it’s always nice to see a Caleperformance. It’s as though Cale hasn’t worked RayJohnson out yet either, or he thinks he hasand gave up too soon, before saying anything incisive. So I’ve also included a recent Cale rendition of the Modern Lovers’ Pablo Picasso, which is much, much better.
Link:John Cale -- Hey Ray (2011)
Link: John Cale -- Pablo Picasso (2010)
By the way, I love the final Ray Johnson quote in the pressrelease about "driving a car" and “shifting gears.” Johnsonwas from Detroit and I guess auto similes were in his blood, the way they seemto be for many Detroiters.
Ray Johnson
Ray Johnson, Nothing, 1993
Ray Johnson, How ToDraw A Bunny, ca. 1955
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