FOOTNOTES #3 Works and Words

27.01.2018–31.08.2019
Online

FOOTNOTES#3 werpt een nieuwe blik op de internationale kunstmanifestatie Works and Words uit 1979, en ontsluit deze via de website van De Appel. We werpen nieuw licht op efemera met betrekking tot dit baanbrekende project, ook met betrekking tot de tentoonstelling van Tamás Kaszás. Deze Footnotes is een onderzoekstraject van De Appel Archive, en reflecteert op de mogelijkheden en beperkingen van transculturele uitwisseling.

Werk mee aan FOOTNOTES#3. De Appel ontvangt graag uw verhaal of artefact in verband met Works and Words via nell [at] deappel.nl.

Album comprising pictures taken by the participants from Andzrej Paruzel's action.

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TOPICS

-Disclaimer-

-A Dilemma-

-Title-

-Research Trips-

-Research Group-

-Preceding Exhibitions-

-Archive Fragment-

-Locations-

-The Opening-

-Film Programme-

-Photography Exhibition-

-Catalogue Reprint-

PEOPLE

-Andrzej Lachowicz-
-Andzrej Kostolowski-
-Andzrej Paruzel-
-Antje von Gravenitz-
-Bucky Grinberg-
-Sanja Iveković and Dalibor Martinis-
-Dóra Maurer-
-Franklin Aalders-
-Harrie de Kroon-
-Harry Ruhé and Endre Tót-
-Gábor Attalai-
-Gábor Bódy-
-György Jovánovics-
-István Szirányi-
-Jacek Jozwiak-
-Jan Mlčoch-
-János Vető-
-Janusz Haka-
-Jerzy Bereś-
-Jiří Kovanda-
-Jozef Robakowski-
-Július Koller-
-Karel Miler-
-Károly Halász-
-Károly Kelemen-
-KwieKulik (Zofia Kulik and Przemysłav Kwiek)-
-Lene Gravesen-
-Marijan Susovski-
-Michel Cardena-
-Michal Kern-
-Mladen Stilinovic-
-Nan Hoover-
-Natalia LL-
-Pawel Kwiek-
-Raša Todosijević-
-Reindeer Werk-
-Romuald Kutera-
-Ryszard Waśko-
-Sándor Pinczehelyi-
-Sef Peeters-
-Tomasz Sikorski-
-Teresa Murak-
-Teresa Tyszkiewicz and Zdzisław Sosnowski-
-Tibor Hajas-
-Tomasz Konart-
-Vladimir Gudac-
-Vladimír Havrilla-
-Zbigniew Warpechowski-
-Zoran Belic-
-Zsigmond Károlyi-

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-Harrie de Kroon-

Harrie de Kroon came into contact with De Appel at a very young age and has since developed a long and fruitful relationship with the organisation, having exhibited performances and installations from 1976 onwards. He was an integral part of both Dutch week and Dutch Treat and also participated in the I am exhibition in Poland (which has generally been considered a precursor to Works and Words due to being an all-Eastern-European exhibition attempting to bridge the gaps between the different countries.)

Later, in 2009 he participated in the Take the Money and Run exhibition alongside thirty other artists including Mladen Stilinovic. In a letter to Wies Smals, Harrie de Kroon proposed an installation that consisted of de Kroon lying in the bottom of a tank that was burning with fuel. The installation was called “Identity”, yet it is not clear whether this was actually performed or not. Harrie de Kroon also installed Jiří Kovanda’s installation, “with the branch.” It is assumed that the two met during the I am exhibition. Kovanda was not given permission to travel to Amsterdam for Works and Words so instructed de Kroon to make the installation on behalf of him, no documentary of the installation survives.

-Lene Gravesen-

Lene Gravesen did not herself exhibit during the Works and Words manifestation but supported many of the artists who did through cooking food and providing accommodation. She chose to invite as many guests as possible in order to facilitate a broader scope, encourage livelier discussions and stimulate a solid network between the invited artists and their western colleagues, many of whom were meeting for the first time. Gravesen was initially connected with De Appel through her former husband, artist Peter Rubin who did not exhibit during the manifestation but had arranged the film programme. She attended the recent Footnotes#3 Gathering at De Appel (May 2019) where Gravesen provided a collection of photographic evidence (included) and written reports of the events during the Manifestation.

Works and Words communal dinner

Footnotes#3 gathering at De Appel Archive May 28, 2019

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-Andzrej Paruzel-

Andzrej Paruzel is a multimedia artist from Poland. Paruzel’s actions were part of the documentation exhibition, for which he wrote the following statement about his artistic work:

Statement by Andzrej Paruzel

As Paruzel describes his newer works, he is interested in “processes dealing with receiving and transforming information through cognitive structures of [the] human mind.” These works “concern processes like perception or memory and they “demand different level of inter-human contacts, than those, expressed in works which function in traditionally understood art circulation.” An example of these new works is the artistic experiment carried out in the Academy of Music Warsaw. During the ‘experiment’ people were asked to create specific shapes from given forms that were paired with different sounds.
Below is the description of the ‘experiment’ and stills from the documenting footage.

Description of the experiment

Andzrej Paruzel also took part in the Works and Words Film Forum in the Stedelijk Museum. According to the photos taken, Film Forum was a panel discussion with Stan Brakhage, Tomislav Gotovac, Peter Rubin, Tomasz Konart, Jozef Robakowski, Gábor Bódy and Malcolm Le Grice.

Film Forum in the Stedelijk Museum

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-Antje von Graevenitz-

Antje von Graeventiz, is an esteemed professor of Art History in Amsterdam as well as working as an art critic and author. She is especially interested in anthropological and interdisciplinary subjects and during Works and Words she gave a lecture entitled “Rites of Passage” which Antje believes considerably changed her career path and helped develop her career within the art world.

In an interview with Nell Donkers and Kaspars Reinis, Von Graevenitz discussed how difficult it was, during Works and Words, to conceptually resolve sensitive topics, such as artistic freedom, in order to not offend E.E. participants. Therefore the subjects had to be addressed tentatively with upmost discretion.

She explains how the general idea of the lecture and discussion session series was to provoke a dialogue in which such issues could be discussed. However, her experience was that it was very hard to talk about these issues, not only because they were taboo topics but also because of the language and cultural obstacles that impeded such conversations from taking shape. One of the key barriers that kept surfacing was that many of the artists that participated from the East were wary of their work being discussed or considered through a political perspective or being purely defined through a nationality or politics of home.

During the exhibition, Antje also took part in Rasa Todosijevic’s “aggressive” performance in the House of Detention, titled Viva la France/Viva la tyrannie where Antje, and one other participant, held tape recorders emitting voice recordings whilst Rasa reacted by hitting metal plates with a metal bar.

Furthermore, she contributed to the publication Narrative Art with her essay The Labyrinths of Narrative Art, in which she discusses narrative art, “story art” and “mysteries” alongside the bridging of art and visual communication with reference to Marc Adams, John Gibson and Liesbeth Brandt Corstius. An extract from this essay can be seen below, taken from Frans Haks Narrative Art published by Groninger Museum, Groningen 1979.

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-Andzrej Kostolowski-

Andzrej Kostolowski, an art historian born in Poland, helped advise on which Polish artists to include within the Manifestation. He, himself, gave a lecture as part of Works and Words, which was considered by many a highlight of the Polish contribution. Previous to the art event he had collaborated with artist Jaroslaw Kozlowski to create the “Net Manifesto” as part of an optimistic phase of international exchanges. Their Net Manifesto was sent to over 350 addresses in 1972 proposing a worldwide informal network of exchange between artists. This was at a time when strict censorship rules and travel limitations dominated across Poland, making it difficult to access art and ideas from outside of the Eastern Bloc. The term “Net” was both a way to get back the postal exchange censorship and ridicule the social governments obsessed with red tape.

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-Franck Gribling-

The Dutch artist Franck Gribling played a crucial role in both the conceptualisation and realization of Works and Words as the idea of exhibiting artists from Eastern European countries was initiated by him. He had began working on this idea from 1973 onwards. Franck Gribling was part of the research group who discussed and came up with the concept of the exhibition. (see audio fragment from the archive post) Additionally, Gribling wrote the introduction for the catalogue, in which he describes the situation of the avant-garde in the various countries.
Franck Gribling held a reading in the Kapel on the 29th of September, his lecture was titled The Function of Avant-Garde Art in Capitalistic Society Today.

A Lecture Without Words by Franck Gribling

Later, on the 7^th of October in 1981 he gave a lecture, A Lecture Without Words as a closing event of his intervention Art for the Millions. This intervention started during Works and Words and went on until 1981 June. It took place in one of the shop windows of the central station of Amsterdam, where “ten thousands of people enter or leave the city” every day. “A minimal space with a maximum number of passers by. How do they see, look or perceive?” He offered the participating artists of Works and Words to submit a private message that would be on display in the Centraal Station for varying periods of time. Below is the proposal of the installation.

The De Appel Bulletin of 1981 states that the same characters that were projected on anonymous passers-by in the Centraal Station of Amsterdam during Works and Words were after buried in sand for an indefinite period of time in a show-case of the Central Station: W.A.I.T.I.N.G.O.N.T.H.E.E.D.G.E.O.F.N.O.W.H.E.R.E

Several artists from the works and words exhibition participated in the installation of the texts, including Raoul Marroquin, Harrie de Kroon, Albert van der Weide, Reindeer Werk, Michel Cardena and Endre Tót.

Art for the Millions in Central Station, Amsterdam

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-Zoran Belic-

Zoran Belic was a Belgrade-based artist who realised live performances and installations through spatial and live sound. Belic’s performance during Works and Words was described by Josephine van Droffelaar as striving for a high degree of formlessness that echoed some of Gerrit Dekker’s previous work, but with a notably strong mystical impact. There is documentation of Belic’s work in the Works and Words catalogue alongside the number of projects that have been described verbally since.

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- Sef Peeters -

Dutch artist Sef Peeters participated in the Works and Words exhibition with an installation. He was still studying at University when he first came into contact with De Appel meaning he was one of the youngest artists the organization had collaborated with. Later in 1977, he went on to form part of De Appel’s programming committee.

Peeters had also participated in Dutch Week in 1976, an arts festival that concentrated on highlighting young artists based in the Netherlands. Later, in 1978 he exhibited an installation titled What I leave behind that intended to incite feelings of discomfort, strangeness and uncertainty.

-Jan Mlčoch-

Jan Mlčoch a performance artist, photographer from the Czech Republic. He did not get permission to come to Amsterdam in the fall of 1979. Documentation of many of his performance works was presented in the Works and Words exhibition. Below are a few of them with descriptions written by Mlčoch.

Dranching Away

Ladder

Peter's Case

Sources in the Dark

Washing

Members of De Appel met Mlčoch on the research trip to Czechoslovakia in 1979. Josine van Drofelaar, who met Mlčoch describes him in the travel reports as one of the most interesting artists she saw in Prague. After Works and Words De Appel again invited him to realize a solo show next year, in 1980. However, for the same reasons Mlčoch couldn’t come to the Netherlands. Therefore, the artist gave instructions to De Appel team by mail to install his installation. The installation was called “Free Dormitory”: ten army beds were set up in the exhibition space, where anyone could spend the night. In the archive there are many texts with detailed descriptions and very personal impressions about the work both by the artist, the organizers and theoreticians – such as a text by Helena Kontova, art critic, in which she outlines Jan Mlčoch’s work as a performance artist. And another text by Petr Stembera:

Text by Helena Kontova page 1

Text by Helena Kontova page 2

Text by Stembera page 1

Text by Stembera page 2

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-Mladen Stilinovic-

Mladen Stilinovic came to Works and Words as an already prominent artist in Yugoslavia. As part of the manifestation he presented two films, a performance and a lecture. Works and Words was the first time Stilinovic had performed in front of a “western” audience.

Both his performance and his lecture were critical of either fellow participating artists or the concept of the manifestation itself. The performance was entitled Foot-Bread Relationship, (or the relation between leg and bread, the criticism of performance, the relation-ship between the foot and the bread.) In this performance Stilinovic was stood next to a loaf of bread, ready to kick it. However, he did not carry out such an act of “bread-kicking”, instead he stuck pictures on the wall of him previously doing so. This was a means of him criticizing performance artists who focused on the documentation of their performances instead of making use of its immediacy.

His lecture “Speech on Language and Power” (or Discourse about Language and Power) critically addressed the hegemony of the English language. Accordingly, Stilinovic gave the lecture in Croatian, so very few, if any, of the audience could understand.

His was part of the Take the Money and Run exhibition in 2009 where thirty arts reflected upon the relationship between the economic and symbolic value of art within the auction house, alongside in the EYE Museum for the Works and Words event in 2018.

-Gábor Attalai-

Gábor Attalai (1934-2011) was a textile and graphic artist and a prominent figure of conceptual art in Hungary. Gábor Attalai received his invitation to the manifestation very late. Piotr Olzanszki, one of the organizers of Works and Words expected László Beke to invite Attalai, but as a result of miscommunication this never happened. The first invitation sent to Attalai is dated 27^th of August, a few weeks before the manifestation. When the artist received the mail there was barely any time left to send his works. Fortunately, the artist participated in another exhibition a few months before organized by Gerrit Jan de Rook, “Eastern European Conceptual Photography” in Eindhoven. (See Preceding Exhibitions) Therefore, Gerrit Jan de Rook still had photographs by Attalai, which he could send to De Appel. These works were shown in the exhibition and Attalai made an installation for Works and Words as well.

Gábor Attalai's works from the Oost-Europese Conceptuele Fotografie catalogue

Attalai’s famous concept was the red-y made series. Red-y mades were everyday objects or buildings covered with red enamel paint. The series was a reflection on the concept of ready-made art as well as a political commentary with the symbolic red color. Josine van Drofelaar mentions in the correspondence that she is particularly interested in Attalai’s red-y mades. As Piotr Olzanski had previously met Attalai he already had an impression of these installation works. In response the artist asks Piotr Olzanski to recreate or “improvise” a red-y made. However, at the end Attalai himself created proposals of red-y made installations for the Works and Words venue. Attalai created these proposals with the photographs of the space, which he received by mail. Attalai wrote that he was mostly inspired by the light bulbs and window-space relations. Below are the propositions that were exhibited along the Attalai’s photographs.

Red-y Made for the Works and Words venue

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-Michel Cardena-

Michel Cardena was one of the nine founding members of the In-Out Center, the first independent artist space in Amsterdam for performance, video and other forms of art. Cardena, a Colombian-Dutch artist, is considered a pioneer of video art in the Netherlands. First exhibiting at De Appel in 1976, Cardena typically presented video performances and was particularly interested in working with several cameras at once in order to record from different angles. In 1977 he was invited to form part of De Appel’s programming committee.

During Works and Words he presented a work at the Amsterdam Central Station entitled I’m Waiting for You as part of his company Warming Up Etc. Etc. Etc. The performance lasted for one hour between noon and 13.00 and consisted of a multi-channel video piece and live performance that was critical of capitalist-driven Western society. He also performed in a café in Haarlemmerplein using their billiard table, with an overall expected audience of over 200 people.

-Gábor Bódy-

Gábor Bódy (1946 -1985) was a pioneer of experimental cinema in Hungary. Bódy was one of the 21 Hungarian participants in the Works and Words exhibition. It is not clear whether he came to Amsterdam for the exhibition or only his films were screened.

Unendliches Bild und Spiegelung (1972)

Josine van Droffelaar who travelled to Hungary in preparation for the exhibition, describes the situation of Hungarian film production in her travel reports: “There are approximately 5 different certificates one needs to obtain in order to screen abroad, but it is also possible that a certificate is issued that says that the film should never be shown. So in principle everyone is free to make what they want, but not free to show what they want. To show films in the West one can go two ways: either to proceed the official way or to make copies of the film and smuggle them out of the country. Dóra Maurer, a filmmaker who enjoys official recognition, can show her films everywhere in principle. Like Gábor Bódy, who, for example, could go to Oberhausen.” Probably Josine referred to the renown International Short Film Festival Oberhausen, where Bódy's film Private History was shown in 1978.

Gábor Bódy, to no surprise, was invited to show his films in Amsterdam. In the Film Programme, three of his films were featured:

‘Four Bagatelles’, 1975, 10’, b/w, 35mm, opt.sd.

‘Psychocosmos’, 1976, 12’, b/w, 35mm, opt.sd. 9

‘The American Postcard’, 1978, 90’, b/w, 35mm, opt.sd.

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-Tomasz Sikorski-

Tomasz Sikorski is a Polish interdisciplinary visual artist. Sikorski presented two silent films as part of the Works and Words film exhibition: Records and Compromise alongside multimedia performance Ontological Sign. The Works and Words program also shows that Sikorski performed in a nearby chapel on September 21, however there is no recordings from this, only the photos included.

Sikorski produced two monographs Autorecording and Tekst . Both of these monographs contain works in which the artist shows the artistic process of creation. He also visually documented many of the performances throughout the Manifestation with a series of photographs.

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-Ryszard Waśko-

Documentation of Ryszard Wasko's works sent in by the artists

Ryszard Waśko’s video-installation was presented during the opening of Works and Words. In the catalogue it appears under the title Space Out Of, but other sources refer to it as Fatigue/Weariness of My Leg. The same work was presented in the Pier+Ocean: Construction in the Art in the Seventies exhibition in London, Hayward Gallery in 1980, organized by Gerhard von Graevenitz, artist and former board member of De Appel.

Photo of Ryszard Wasko in front of his installation 'Space Out Of'

Ryszard Waśko is a prominent multi-media artist from Poland, throughout his career he was also involved in the organization of events and curated exhibitions. Ryszard Waśko was the initiator and main organizer of the international exhibition Konstrukcja w Procesie (Construction in Proccess) in Łódź, Poland in 1981. Several artists of Konstrukcja w Procesie previously participated in Works and Words, such as: Servie Janssen, Tomasz Konart, Pawel Kwiek, Dóra Mauer and Antoni Mikołajczyk. The idea of Konstrukcja w Procesie came to Ryszard Waśko after he participated in Pier+Ocean upon the invitation of Gerhard von Graevenitz. From Galeria Wschodnia’s website one can read Ryszard Waśko’s impression of the exhibition:

In 1980, just before "Solidarity" was born, Polish artist Ryszard Waśko was invited by another artist Gerhard v. Graevenitz to take part in an exhibition of art of the 1970's called "Pier + Ocean" in London. The most outstanding artists participated in this event, representing such trends in art of those times as conceptualism, minimal art, land art, structuralism, etc.
Ryszard Waśko, who personally went there said afterwards:
"I had different feelings about this exhibition. On one hand I was impressed watching for the first time, such a full and comprehensive presentation of the most important ideas, artistic attitudes and pieces that had come into existence in the art world since the end of the 60's, through the 70's. And of course, it was great to be invited to take part in this exhibition because I felt connected to this movement. The show kind of made me think, naturally, that it was too bad there had been no chance to organize such an event in Poland so far. I felt it as a big loss. On the other hand, though, the exhibition seemed quite dead because of its dry, museum-style presentation of the objects, taken out of the life and context in which they were created. In other words, the 'process' of creating itself - which was often perceived in the 70's as a subject, a piece of art - was left out in the London show. Therefore this exhibition lost its power. In my opinion, a lack of an aspect of 'process' was a weakness of it. After that, the idea for the title ‘Construction in Process’, for an event in Lodz, came to my mind. I tried to emphasize the importance of two important aspects of art of the 70's, so that the sense of the word 'process' would be understood in its broad meaning and context."

After Konstrukcja w Procesie Ryszard Waśko curated the publication of Fabryka in 1982. The publication contains works of artists participating in Konstrukcja w Procesie. Fabryka was self-published, printed underground by Waśko and others. In Fabryka appears a manifesto written by Waśko, which he later set as a program for the future artists of the following Konstrukcja w Procesie exhibitions. There were 200 copies printed, one of them can be found in De Appel's archive.

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-Janusz Haka-

Polish artist Janusz Haka was considered a lesser-known, emerging artist at the time of Works and Words. He produced experimental both film and photography for the manifestation and also has one work in De Appel’s Collection (Unintended). He had previously shown design work and photography in Flash Art magazine.

1978

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-Pawel Kwiek-

Pawl Kwiek was born in Warsaw and was considered one of the forerunners for video art in Poland. He specializes in experimental film, video art, photography, drawing and is the author of many manifestations focusing on theoretical texts and neoavant-garde art. He was included in the photography exhibition as part of Works and Words. In 2018 De Appel visited Pawel to show and discuss his works in the 1979 exhibition.

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Károly Halász and Sándor Pinczehelyi

Károly Halász (1946-2016) and Sándor Pinczehelyi (1946) were both part of Pécsi Műhely [Pécsi Workshop], an artist collective based in Pécs, Hungary. The neo-avantgarde artist group aimed to renew the Hungarian constructivist and avant-garde artistic traditions, to create a new visual language. The artists of Pécsi Műhely were discovering the possibilities of land art; Halász and Pinczehelyi were especially interested in conceptual art. They presented the folllowing photographs in Works and Words:

Sándor Pinczehelyi - Star (Cobblestone) 1972

Sándor Pinczehelyi - Star (Edit) 1972

Károly Halász - Private Broadcast I. - 1974 photoaction

László Beke, Hungarian art critic and advisor of the exhibition, recommended the artists of Pécsi Műhely to De Appel. Through the letters to Károly Halász, De Appel tried to reach other members of Pécsi Műhely, such as Ferenc Ficzek, Károly Kismányoki and Kálmán Szijjártó but they never came in contact with De Appel.

Sándor Pinczehelyi previously participated in the "Eastern-European Conceptual Photography" exhibition in Eindhoven, curated by Gerrit Jan de Rook. (See Preceding Exhibitions) Sándor Pinczehelyi’s work is on the cover of the exhibition's catalogue.

Pinczehelyi Sándor - Hammer and Sickle I. on the cover of the catalogue

In the catalogue of one of Károly Halász’s solo-exhibition in 1988, Lóránd Hegyi writes:

“He is not building a homogenous ouvre like his Western-European and North-American colleagues are, who can rely on a developed infrastructure and smoothly functioning institutional system in the arts, on the backing of the art trade providing a financial security and the essential working conditions, and, last but not least, on the secure basis of cultural tolerance. Avant-garde artists of Central Eastern Europe were forced to fight for the very right for their activities’ existence for long decades, they had to accommodate themselves outside of the official institutional system of art. (A typical example of this accommodation was the Pécsi Műhely functioning between 1970 and 1980 that Károly Halász had belonged to all along…)” (from the text The Károly Halász Nonpareil)

The cover of the catalogue of Károly Halász's exhibition in 1988

Lóránd Hegyi, Hungarian art historian, who helped advising De Appel team, gave a lecture during Works and Words, and his text “The Loss of Collective Validities” is included in the catalogue.

Lóránd Hegyi gives a lecture in the Kapel venue of 'Works and Words'

Károly Halász, prior to Works and Words collaborated with Videoheads in Amsterdam. Videoheads founded by Jack Moore, was a production studio for video-art. They collaborated with artists and helped in the production of their video-works. Among others, Nan Hoover and Raoul Marroquin work with Videoheads. The studio also assisted De Appel in the organization of Works and Words. In a letter to De Appel Károly, Halász mentioned that Videoheads had his videotape, Transition that De Appel could use for the exhibition. De Appel contacted Jack Moore for permission for Halász’s video. It is not clear whether the video was screened during the exhibition at the end. When Halász was in Amsterdam he didn’t have the money to buy a cassette to get a copy of his video, so in his letter in 1979 also asked De Appel to send it to him. Almost 30 years later, in 2007 Halász contacted De Appel again in search for Transition. This time De Appel sent a DVD copy of the video.

Excerpt from Károly Halász: Transition, 1978

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-Jozef Robakowski-

Jozef Robaskowski is a Polish filmmaker, photographer and performance artist who focuses on exploring the relationship of psycho-physical organisms and mechanical registrations. Due to no travel restrictions between Amsterdam and Poland, he was part of the Works and Words film programme that was eventually made up of 20 Polish artists. His exhibited works included Exercise for two hands and On the line with both films falling under the heading “experimental.”

Robaskowski’s work had already been seen in earlier exhibitions in the Netherlands and was considered in line with the Constructivist traditions that both the Netherlands and Poland had in common so was particularly received well by Western audiences.

-Nan Hoover-

After the Works and Words event an article titled International Appel Manifestation: East European art puts theory first was published in de Volkskrant, a reknown Dutch newspaper, written by art critic, Marga van Mechelen.

In her article Mechelen focuses on the differences between Dutch artists and those of the invited countries. Mechelen writes, referring to Hungarian and Polish artists, that “they are trying to escape from the values of traditional art, in which the product is the only thing that matters.” “Moreover, the discussion during or after a performance is considered very essential [for the non-Dutch artists and audience].” Accordingly, Mechelen to point out the differences, describes not only the performances but the audience’s reactions as well.

One of the performances discussed is Nan Hoover’s Progressions, performed in the Stedelijk Museum as part of Works and Words. Nan Hoover, American artist who lived and worked in the Netherlands at the time, was a pioneer in light, video and performance art. The artist had already been in close connection with De Appel as she presented video installations and performances there from 1976 on. The first Video Evening (Videoavond) in De Appel in 1976 was showing Nan Hoover's video work. Nan Hoover showed her first video-performance, Light Shapes for the Dutch Week event in 1976. Nan Hoover's works were characterized by her fascination with the contrast between dark and light, and the play with the transition from reality to abstraction. (From the book De Appel Performances Installations Video Projects 1975-1983 by M. van Mechelen.)

Mechelen on Nan Hoover’s performance Progression: “Difference in opinion about the function of performance appeared also from the reactions to the performance of Nan Hoover in the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam. In a completely dark room five columns made of white paper were placed on one line. Nan Hoover stood in front of these columns, while moving her arm slowly. As there was a source of light behind her, coming from a side-projector, it threw shifting shadows onto the white columns. The Dutch audience was very enthusiastic about the performance, but among the Polish artists one heard some critical remarks. Jerzy Bereś, for example, considered it as an 'over-traditional interpretation of the (Latin) word "opus".' He himself is more interested in a new interpretation of this word.”

According to Mechelen, performance art for Dutch artists was mainly perceived as an aesthetic product of the artists’ ‘individiualism’ and ‘personal mythologies’. For the other countries the de-mystification of art was characteristic of performance–it went beyond aesthetics as it did not draw a distinction between life and art. Accordingly, in these countries the distinction between artists and art critics, between “works and words” is blurred. (See also De Appel Performances Installations Video Projects 1975-1983 by M. van Mechelen)

Since 2008 the Nan Hoover Foundation takes care of the artist’s legacy.

Excerpt from the video of Nan Hoover's performance in the Stedelijk Museum, 1979. Courtesy of LIMA, Amsterdam.

An English version of Marga van Mechelen's article originally published in Dutch in de Volkskrant

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-Tomislav Gotovac-

Tomislav Gotovac is a Yugoslavian artist that focuses predominantly photography, film and sound art. Although Gotovac showed eight filmed at the Manifestation, including The Morning of Faun, Straight Line (Stevens – Duke), Blue Rider, Circle, I feel alright, T, M and Glenn Miller/High School Backyard I little has been documented about the films or experience. Gotovac’s films have a distinct quality that Hrvoje Turkovic describes feels like they “seem to be left over to chance.”

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-Servie Janssen-

Servie Janssen (1949-2018) Dutch artist studied in the Kraków Academy of Fine Arts in 1971. His connection to Poland ran through his whole career as a passionate artist and performer. On the 14^th of July 2018 in a conversation between Servie Janssen and Nell Donkers, Janssen mentioned the influence and his close relation to the artistic movement constructivism, and especially to Kazimir Malevich. In the same conversation Servie Janssen emphasized that he finds the publication “Pier+Ocean: Construction in the art of the seventies” (Arts council of Great Britain, 1980) the most important.

After “I Am” and “Works and Words” Janssen also took part in the international exhibition Construction in Process (Konstrukcja w Procesie) in 1980 in Łódź, Poland. He wrote in an email: “What strikes me about Poland is that this line of constructivism that started with Kazimir Malevich and Henrik Stazewski - in no other former Eastern Bloc country you will find this in such a way – (Stazewski was a member of the honorary committee for Konstrukcja w Procesie) - and they saw in my 9 rectangles work a promising link to current events, all the more so since a whole generation of conservatives were still finding their way, in a kind of surrealism and absurdism in art (especially graphic artists).” The documentation of his 9 rectangles performance (the one he performed in Works and Words) was exhibited and he performed “This side is Red” during which he read titles of Friedrich Nietzsche’s works while lying on the floor next to a neon sign.

Janssen held a performance combined with an exhibition “Restrained will-facts and pushed forward intuition, anyway” in De Appel in 1978. Art critic, Marga van Mechelen in her book “De Appel 1975-1983” writes that Janssen’s performance was influenced by his journey to Canada.

Later, as Louwrien Wijers writes in a witness report, Janssen’s artistic development was defined by his interest in shapes in space. In Works and Words Servie Janssen held a performance in the Kapel venue on the 26^th of September in 1979. During the performance Janssen repeatedly built and deconstructed structures of wooden sticks, originally in the shapes of 9 rectangles. Below is a witness report with detailed description by Louwrien Wijers.

This is the book Janssen distributed at the end of his performance Waypassenger NorthFeelLand:

In 2011 Janssen re-enacted the 9 rectangles performance with Agata Bielska in the Filmschool in Łódź in collaboration with Muzeum Sztuki.

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-Natalia LL-

Natalia LL participated in the photography exhibition of the Works and Words program. Natalia is a visual artist who works with photography, video-art, painting, installation and performance. Natalia is a pioneer of feminist art in Poland. She, prior to Works and Words, had been in contact with De Appel, they invited her to participate in the Feministische Kunst Internationaal Exhibition in 1978.

In the Works and Words catalogue Natalia LL wished to include photographs from a different project and not “Artificial Photography” what she presented at the manifestation. In the correspondence we can see that the organizers returned the original works from the exhibition, thus there is no copy of them in our archive. In the series of “Artificial Photography” the artist creates the illusion of movement while exposing private body parts, simultaneously drawing attention to the artificiality of the unmoved photography.

Pyramid, 1979

Natalia LL could not come to Amsterdam for the manifestation, she sent in her material by mail: photographs and theoretical texts as well (Dream and Reality written by Natalia). Additionally, Natalia LL participated in Jozef Robakowski’s film “Gallery Alive” featuring twenty other Polish artists.

Dream and Reality

a page of Natalia LL's book monograph in the archive

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-Zsigmond Károlyi-

The Hungarian artist contributed with a video installation and photographs to the Works and Words exhibition. His installation consisted of two televisions placed on stands facing one another.

Károlyi in his correspondence with De Appel, gave precise instructions about the way his artwork should be installed. However, the communication was not without difficulties: De Appel approached Károlyi in English and his response a month later arrived in German, as he had to find someone to translate the English letters for him. The correspondence was slow but both parties made efforts to realize the collaboration. Finally, with the help of the “[Művészeti] Alap” (National Art Foundation), Károlyi received his papers that enabled him to come to the Netherlands and personally partake in the exhibition.

This installation was first presented on the Paris Biennale in 1977. This is where Josine van Droffelaar encountered this piece and asked Károlyi to realize it in Amsterdam as well. The two television screens facing each other “showed the artist walking in and out of the frame synchronised, so that it created an illusion that the artist is walking about the place across the monitors.” (in the description of Zsuzsa László)

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-Zbigniew Warpechowski-

Zbigniew Warpechowski is a Polish performance artist, he contributed two performances to the Works and Words manifestation. Aggy Smeets from De Appel met the artist on her research trip to Warsaw. In the travel report one can read her impressions of Polish performance art. According to Aggy Smeets Polish performance is very theatrical and literary compared to Dutch trends. She describes Warpechowski’s performances as unique: he is the least theatrical amongst the Polish performers, however, his works are extremely harmonious, intense and above all philosophical.

On the 26^th of September in the Kapel venue of Works and Words, Warpechowski performed one of his most well known performances, titled the ‘Champion of Golgotha’. In the act the artist wears a sports suit and assembles a cross, made of steel, which he carries onto the loft of the performance space. Then, he climbs up to the cross, arranges himself in a pose similar to the representation of crucified Jesus and “crucifies himself”. In reality, he comfortably stands on the cross. The artist says something to the audience at the end of the performance, from the top of the cross. A video recording of the performance is available in De Appel Archive.

The other performance titled “A short electrical love affair” Warpechowski performed supposedly on the same day. Louwrien Wijers in her witness report describes the performance. In the report one can read how the performance took place in a completely dark room. The audience could see Warpechowski, strangled in electric wires with a light bulb attached to it. When Warpechowksi freed himself from the grip of the wires, he started swinging the now lit light bulb towards the audience. Wijers writes, that the audience moved to the sides, afraid of the aggressively swinging light bulb. Then, the artist placed the wire on a nail on the wall and waited. When the light bulb stopped swinging, the performance ended.

The Archive also contains documentation of several other performances of Warpechowski, such as a “Dialogue with Fish” and “Non-intervention”. The performance “Non-intervention” is included in the catalogue, however, it is not clear whether Warpechowski also performed it during Works and Words.

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-Reindeer Werk-

Reindeer Werk is a performance art-duo formed by the artists Tom Puckey and Dirk Larsen. The duo was active between 1974 and 1980. The artists, already prior to Works and Words, were in collaboration with De Appel. The previous year, in 1978 they held a performance workshop “Predictions” in De Appel. The workshop took 5 full days, as the concept of long and intimate acts was part of their performative practices. They used the word ‘behavior art' in order to describe their ideal. To the Reindeer Werk, in an artwork, the form of behavior is crucial, not the action itself. Their goal was to create a reality through their behavior instead of replicating or mimicking reality.

Concerning their participation in the Works and Words project the Archive contains only documentation of their performance:

Report by Louwrien Wijers

Tom Puckey’s collaboration with De Appel continued even after Works and Words, the artist participated in numerous projects including the Open Avond(S) in 2017.

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-Vladimir Havrilla-

Aggy Smeets, the member of De Appel team, first encountered Vladimir Havrilla’s work during the research trip to Czechoslovakia, when László Beke and Tomas Strauss recommended her to watch his Super8 films. Back then, Havrilla was working as an architectural designer; filmmaking was his hobby. His films were described as very personal, a “strange mix of sculptural elements and pure film.” Aggy Smeets informed Peter Rubin, the organizer of the film program, about Havrilla’s work.

Vladimir Havrilla’s four films were screened in the film program, although Havrilla could not come to the Netherlands to partake in the manifestation personally. As it turns out from the correspondence, Havrilla was not able to make copies of his films neither in Prague, nor in Budapest. Thus the artist sent the originals to Amsterdam, where Peter Rubin had Super8 copies made. The originals were sent back to him later.

Vladimir Havrilla was one amongst the three filmmakers from former Czechoslovakia whose experimental films were screened during the manifestation. Havrilla’s films were not included in the Film Programme but they were shown on the 22^nd September 1979 in the Kapel van het voormalige Huis van Bewaring at Klein Gartmanplantsoen 14 (Leidseplein), which was also the main venue of Works and Words.

Here is the artist’s description of the four films:

His photos were exhibited at the Kunsthuis Fundatie at Lijnbaansgracht 54, Amsterdam. ‘Nicodemus Question’ and ‘White prefers light’ both are series of four photos.

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-KwieKulik-

Zofia Kulik and Przemysłav Kwiek formed KwieKulik, the artist duo from Poland, active between 1971 and 1987.

The artist duo is known for their “Studio of Activities” or “Działenia” concept, which is, according to the duo, the ideal form of art. There is a document in De Appel Archive, “Our Activity: Aims, Principles, Practices, Benefits” written by the two artists, which describes “Działenia” in detail. “Działenia” is the Polish word for activity, the artists insist on using the Polish word in order to differentiate their idea from other forms of Western artistic activities at the time. “Działenia” for them is the activity which is a “constant efficient behavior in concrete situations: existential, artistic, social, political, mental material and spatial.” Their aim was to incorporate this technique into Polish Art: they attempted to draw the attention to the process of artistic production instead of the end product. The “Działenia” technique also involved the documentation and the subsequent communication and publication of the documentation.

the text written by KwieKulik

In the Works and Words event the duo performed an action-installation. Here is the recollection of the artist, writer Louwrien Wijers of the performance: “ During the installation/performance Kwiek and Kuilk were each standing on one side of a table that the sculptured head of a Greek classic and three book on it. The books were by Homerus, by Apollinaire and by themselves and they would in turn read part form [these] texts. Above the table one could read the sentence: ART AS THEY WOULD LIKE IT TO BE.” (Amsterdam, November 1979)

ART AS THEY WOULD LIKE IT TO BE

The artists also presented a film in the Film Program. The 12-minute long film called “Activities” is a footage of a four-day long communal act. The video can be viewed here.

Here is a letter from KwieKulik with instructions for the arrangement of the catalogue. The stamp Kulik and Kwiek use in this letter is a stamp designed for Aart van Barneveld from Stempelplaats in Amsterdam. It depicts the two artists working on a desk and simultaneously running, with huge flags in the background. As it is described in the book "Form is a Fact of Society" “the stamp was an ironic comment on trying to escape the propaganda while seeking to concentrate on an independent practice.”

Nell Donkers, De Appel's archivist visited Zofia Kulik in her home in Łódź, in 2019. Zofia showed her personal archive, which she created to document her artistic activities.

The 'Works and Words' file in Zofia Kulik's archive

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-Tibor Hajas-

The archived correspondence between Tibor Hajas and De Appel suggests that Hajas played a central role in the communication with Hungarian participants by providing information on fellow artists, such as János Vető, as well as the art historians Lóránd Hegyi and László Beke. However, the correspondence reveals that the communication was mainly conducted through telephone, thus it is not recorded.

During De Appel’s research trip in February of 1979 to Budapest, Hajas hosted a dinner where Hegyi and Beke were invited as well, where they discussed the upcoming exhibition.

Hajas as a prominent Hungarian artist was discussed by both of the art critics invited to the manifestation. Lóránd Hegyi’s essay was not published in the catalogue in its entirety, only the first two pages out of four. (See below.) The art critic in this text focuses on the individual expression of the artists and the individual reception of the viewer as the “collective values” fade away from social life. Hegyi argues that due to the lack of community in the “mass society of modern industrial-technological age”, without a homogenous society one can only talk about the individual. Thus Hegyi refuses to talk about the “whole situation of Hungarian avantgarde of the late seventies” instead he analyzes the “vision” of one artist, Tibor Hajas:

A work of Hajas annexed to the text.

We don't know where this text was originally published. In the archive they stand as individual papers (four copies), as being torn from a book. This one is signed to Josine van Droffelaar by someone.

Hajas was planning a performance in the framework of Works and Words, of which there is no documentation in the archive except for his plans documented in the correspondence. The artist was only asking for a white empty room or “something like a torture-chamber” concerning the space and for magnesium powder. Hajas writes “I never have very complicated projects; they disgust me.”

In addition, his film “Self-Fashion Show” (1976) was featured in the film programme of Works and Words in the Stedelijk Museum.* Tibor Hajas’ photo-works were exhibited as well. He was planning to exhibit three series of photographs: ‘Image Whippings’, ‘Flesh Paintings’ and ‘Surface Tortures’. There is no record, of how many of these photos were actually exhibited – but in a letter he objected to the idea to limit the number of the works he would like to exhibit:

“Yes, I know that it’s very difficult to exhibit the whole East- and Central-Europe in one gallery; but you can understand my situation as well; to show one or two works only because of the lack of place doesn’t mean more than the simple gesture of taking part in an event.”

The collaboration of De Appel and the artist did not stop with Works and Words. The artist gave a performances and exhibited photoworks in 1980 in Gent in the framework of the “6 Hongaarse kunstenaars” and other exhibitions working together with De Appel.

*This film was screened in the EYE Museum in the Works and Words: Revisiting Film as/and art form 1970s East Central Europe (2018).

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-Karel Miler-

During the second research trip De Appel went to Czechoslovakia where, among others, they met Karel Miler. Miler is a visual poet, a photographer, a photo performer as well as an art historian/ critic – “een aardige man” as described by De Appel team. Before the manifestation in September the team meant to visit him once more but due to health issues this meeting was never realized.

In the archive, only the copies of the letters from De Appel can be found, but not the responses from Miler. However, the remaining letters show the complications that occurred concerning the photo works that Karel sent to De Appel as can be seen below:

The single side of the correspondence, which is available, reveals that Miler did not send De Appel the negatives of the photographs he had planned to exhibit and he also sent them different photographs than those he had sent originally. They were not conceptual enough and Miler was asked to send other photos in again. All of this had to be rushed as the manifestation was to take place a few weeks after this correspondence.

Since Karel Miler had previously exhibited his work in Eindhoven in 1977 De Appel asked him whether there were still works of his there, that they could use for Works and Words. Since we don’t have Karel’s letter responses we do not know what happened.

Karel Miler, Being Smelt by Fresh Grass

Karel Miler, Closer to Clouds

Karel Miler, Couting 1-30

Karel Miler, Present Rain

Karel Miler, The Saint Me

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-Franklin Aalders-

After receiving the Works and Words catalogue in 1980, Aalders sent a letter to De Appel saying that De Appel did a good job with this booklet. In this letter he included a number of felt tip drawings.

Franklin Aalders born in 1941, Amsterdam. He was educated at the Academie voor Beeldende Kunsten in Arnhem. He has lived and made art in The Netherlands for his entire life. The works he exhibited at the Works and Words manifestation shared many formal similarities with those of the East-Central European artists.

'I am laying in the crash barrier', 1977.

'I am hanging over the crash barrier of Oude Rijn', 1977.

'I am laying along the runway of Schiphol', 1977.

'I am hanging over the crash barrier of Oude Rijn', 1977.

'I am laying along the runway of Schiphol', 1977.

WORKS-WORDS-De-Appel-Kapel-Huis-van-Bevaring-fot-TSikorski-2-middle-Franklin-Aalders-on-the-right-Gerti-Fietzek-in-bright-pants

WORKS-WORDS-De-Appel-Kapel-Huis-van-Bevaring-fot-TSikorski-3-middle-Franklin-Aalders-on-the-right-Gerti-Fietzek-in-bright-pants

WORKS-WORDS-De-Appel-Kapel-Huis-van-Bevaring-fot-TSikorski-20-Barbara-Heinisch-Franklin-Aalders

De-Appel-Kapel-Huis-van-Bevaring-fot-TSikorski-21-AParuzel-JJóźwiak-Piotr-Olszański-TSikorski-FAalders.

WORKS-WORDS-De-Appel-Kapel-Huis-van-Bevaring-fot-TSikorski-35-after-Zbigniew-Warpechowski-performance-F.Aalders-G.Fietzek

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-Buky Grinberg-

Buky Grinberg was arrested by the police on the streets of de Oude Pijp neighbourhood of Amsterdam during his performance in the Works and Words manifestation.

In a recent e-mail correspondence, Buky Grinberg explained his performance:

“… nobody except me knew what was about to happen! The plan was so radical and guerrilla type that I had to keep it secret. Even Wies Smals, the organiser, didn't know a thing about its content until 5 min. before it should start. Even though Wies was surprised from the whole scene she was acting in my favour in front of the police, helped to free me from a night arrest and later gave a positive testimony in court which only had confiscated the performance car (worth those days something like 200 fl...).”

Description of performance (from Buky's e-mail):

“The performance took place in Amsterdam, planned to run along Albert Cuypstraat (starting on Ferdinand Bolstraat corner, ending on Van Woustraat corner) on Sunday afternoon when the market is off.

The spectators, wearing yellow executioner’s hoods, were divided into two groups meant to march in two parallel, synchronized lines on both sidewalks of the street. Between them, along the street – from one side to the other, a black car with no license plates, is driven by myself, wearing a black executioner's hood. I accelerate gradually. Every time the car reaches its point of collision with the walking processions, it makes a U-turn and repeats the course until at the end of the street the distance is reduced to a 'dead end' and velocity reaches its maximum. The car 'explodes' and goes up in flames.

This performance was stopped by the Amsterdam police on grounds of suspicious gathering.

Thanks – Buky Grinberg”

Buky Grinberg has collaborated with De Appel in more than one occasion. In 1976 De Appel and Grinberg worked together in order to apply for an installation project in The Hague. In November 1977 Buky Grinberg held an installation performance at De Appel (at the Brouwersgracht location).

1977 Invitation to Buky Grinberg's event at De Appel, 1977.

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-Teresa Murak-

Teresa Murak is known for the incorporation of natural elements into her artworks – in the Works and Words exhibition the documentation of previous nature-related works represented the artist. There were numerous works exhibited, even though, there had never been personal contact between the artist and De Appel team. During their visit to Warsaw, Murak did not show up to their meetings and she was also not able to come to Amsterdam to personally participate in the show due to several reasons including her pregnancy. De Appel – with Murak’s invitation – would have had to cover all the costs of her visit including her medical costs, consequently the gallery decided not to take the risk considering Murak’s pregnancy. Therefore, Murak contributed to the exhibition by the way of sending her works by mail. These works included: photographs of previous performances, projects, an 8 mm color film documenting a project. In addition, she sent a proposal for an installation she planned for the canal in front of the gallery, however, there is no documents in the archive proving that the installation was ever realized.

The works presented included the documentation of the artist’s project Equilibirium of Balance (1974). This performance was conducted during the Art Symposium in Ubbeboda in Sweden. The documentation of the performance was presented alongside the photographs of the project Cradle-Seed-Time (1975) in which the artist grew plants in her hand.

'Lady’s Smock' (nd)

Cradle-Seed-Time (1975)

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-Vladimir Gudac-

-Marjan Susovski-

When De Appel visited Yugoslavia (Zagreb and Beograd) for the purpose of a research trip in February 1979, they met with a lot of artists, but not with Vladimir Gudac. De Appel initially met with Marjan Susovski, who informed De Appel of Gudac. Susovski was the director of Gradska Galerija Suvremene Umjetnosti (the museum for modern art) in Zagreb. Susovski was described (in the report from De Appel’s research trip to Yugoslavia) as a very progressive man who influenced the ‘kunstklimaat’ very positively in Zagreb. He not only helped De Appel by proposing Gudac, he also proposed many Yugoslavian artists and a lot of useful documentation (catalogues, books, information etc.).

According to Susovski, the artistic atmosphere was a bit more melancholic in Beograd, but that was definitely not the case in Zagreb. Zagreb was more artistically stimulated, also because of the sort of people that resided in Zagreb, who apparently had a more progressive ideology.

De Appel sent a letter on the 7^th August 1979 inviting Gudac to participate as part of the photography exhibition during the Works and Words manifestation. De Appel had a very vague idea of the kind of work he made, especially of his photography, but seemed willing to include him in the programme. In his letter, in response to De Appel’s invitation, he states, “in the last 3 years I made works about culture & art, social – art, relationships and no konceptual tehnic (conceptual technique) called from my friend (Susovski).” He argued that his work would be quite difficult for a Western European to understand as many of his works were based on “language jokes and cultural specificity.”

The works that were shown at the photo exhibition at the Fundatie Kunsthuis in Amsterdam were:

‘Price’, 1979, book.

‘Spaghetti’, 1979, book.

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-Antoni Mikołajczyk-

Antoni Mikołajczyk (1939-2000), known for his photography and installation works, was an artist of Polish nationality. During the Works and Words manifestation his photographic work ‘Total registration’, 1974 was exhibited as a part of the photo exhibition at the Fundatie Kunsthuis in Amsterdam.

Mikołajczyk also features in Robakowski’s ‘Gallery alive’, 1975, (35’’, colour, sound), where each artist was presented for one and a half minutes. His ‘Motion and Space – Video Tape’ (15 minutes) was shown at De Appel during Works and Words.

The information on Mikołajczyk is very scarce in De Appel archive. There is no record of him in the Works and Words archive or in the general archive. He has also not been mentioned in the report of the research trip of Aggy Smeets and Josine van Droffelaar to East Central Europe.

There are, however, two books in the library collection that showcase him, as well as his collaboration with De Appel:

Antoni Mikołajczyk: documentation, actions, photography, video. 1970-1979.

LINIA: Osieki – 16-30/08/1980 exhibition/ Symposium.

Loose photograph found in Antoni Mikołajczyk: Documentation Actions Photography Video 1970 -1979.

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-Jerzy Bereś-

Jerzy Bereś (1930 – 2012) was a Polish performance artist. The performance he carried out at the Works and Words manifestation may be the most photographically documented from the entire manifestation.

In the report from the research trip to East-Central Europe there is a lot written about Bereś. De Appel team had heard a lot about him. They were very excited to meet him in person. Startled by his unusual looks, De Appel team encountered a wild-looking and free-spirited artist from Krakow. It is written that he was invited also because he was very important in the context of the Polish art scene other than the fact that his art was very intense and thought provoking. In that respect, Magdalena Ujma notes the “Bereś’s symbolic performances attest to a belief in the power of art to disseminate a message and bring about change” (Bryzgel A. Performance art in Eastern Europe since 1960 rethinking art’s histories. (2017), 241)

De Appel team also reports that his work had been subject to a lot of critique, due to his rather direct and ‘naked’ approach to arts.. Reading the report, the people who wrote it seemed very enthusiastic about what he would bring to the Works and Words manifestation.

Jerzy Bereś performed on the 29^th September 1979 at the Huis van Bewaring in Amsterdam. His performance was called

‘Tractatus Philosophicus’ Three items

1. Object – subject

2. I biological – I transcendental

3. Two notions of work; previously existing and newly proposed.

Watchword of a new notion of work

Pure content as in opposition to pure form

‘Tractatus Philosophicus’ Works and Words, Huis van Bewaring, Amsterdam 1979.

Photos from Jerzy Beres' performance at Works and Words, Amsterdam, 1979.

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-Raša Todosijević-

Raša Todosijević from Yugoslavia, just like many Czech artists, were very opposed to the initial idea and concept of this manifestation – which was basically a show case of Eastern European art (scroll down to East – West problem). In a letter from Josine van Droffelaar to Rasa on June 13^th 1979 explains that “after a lot of discussion we decide[d] to change the concept a little bit, but in general not.”

De Appel invited Todosijević to come to Amsterdam to express his disagreement towards the concept of the ‘Eastern European’ manifestation in The Netherlands. De Appel really wanted him to come, so in the case that the ministry of culture would not finance his travel, De Appel would make sure to find a to get him to Amsterdam.

In response to this letter (about 1.5 months later), Todosijević said that he would be willing to participate in the manifestation under the title ‘Works and Words’. Included in this letter is a list of 5 points in which Todosijević lays out his plans for the manifestation. After not being able to acquire financing from his home country, Todosijević also claims that his being there, now depended on De Appel.

From the correspondence and the travel reports one can conclude that Todosijević was in a tough point of his life. Droffellaar asks him in the letter of June 13^th 1979 if he still feels ‘very depressed and sick of the whole situation in Beograd’. In the report from the research trip to Yugoslavia, they describe Todosijević as a sort of dissident, one of the few artists in Beograd that manifested through the means of performance. They also questioned why he just didn’t leave Beograd (Belgrade) if he was so unhappy; there was no restriction in leaving Yugoslavia.

Amongst other works, the most memorable from the Works and Words manifestation in 1979 would be his performance: Vivle la France, Vive la Tyrannie which lasted for about 45 minutes and was created especially for the purpose of the international manifestation of Works and Words in 1979.

Below are pictures that were (probably) taken by Ulay.

Performance: Vive la France Vive la Tyranny

Performance: Vive la France Vive la Tyranny.

Pictures of a TV-programme on Dutch television coming from the archive of Beeld en Geluid in Hilversum. In the description it says: Ontzettend moeilijke en niet eenvoudige "performance" door Joegoslavische en Poolse kunstenaars in voormalig Huis van Bewaring Amsterdam. ( Very complicated en not simple "performance" by Yugoslavian and Polish artists in the former prison in Amsterdam.) In the Archive of De Appel is a research copy available

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-János Vető-

János Vető was invited as a trainee for Loek van de Sande (board member of De Appel) to his company ‘Total Design’ in Amsterdam. This was the only way for him to be able to participate in Works and Words in September 1979.

When De Appel team was visiting Hungary during their research trip, they met János Vető in the house of Tibor Hajas. On this occasion Vető photographed Aggy Smeets, these photos are still in De Appel Archive. In the travel reports Vető is described as a ‘very autobiographical artist’. The research team decided to invite the artist to Amsterdam, thus they arranged the traineeship for him.

János Vető participated with numerous works in the photo exhibition at the Fundatie Kunsthuis in Amsterdam. De Appel usually requested a maximum of 6 photographs per artist, which they would further filter, due to the limited space. Thus, in the correspondence (22^nd June 1979,) they asked the artists to send no more than five photos. Still, they exhibited all the photographs the artist submitted!

‘Before and After Science – Song for Europe’, 1978.

‘Before and After Science – Accident’, 1978

‘Before and After Science – Bossom’, 1978

‘Before and After Science –Guts’, 1973

‘Before and After Science –Uranium’, 1978

‘Another yellow continent’, 1976, seven photos.

Photo from the János Vetö exhibition at Fundatie Kunsthuis. September 1979, Amsterdam.

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-Jiří Kovanda-

At the time of Works and Words Jiří Kovanda was 26. In the travel reports of the research trip to the ČSSR, De Appel reported that he was a “heel jong conceptueel kunstenaar (…) heel minimal (…) deed me aan het werk van Karel Miler en hier bij ons Harrie de Kroon denken.” A young conceptual artist, very minimal, made me think of the works of Karel Miler and of Harrie Kroon here in the Netherlands.

Czechoslovakia was the country with the least participating artists at the manifestation, due to political ideological reasons (see Dilemmas section below), Jiří Kovanda could not come either. He, however, asked Harrie de Kroon to install his installation for him. Jiří tried to draw his concept to help with the installation process but as he did not know the dimensions Harrie had to make some decisions for him.

Jiří Kovanda also contributed to the photo exhibition with 6 works:

‘18^thNovember 1976 – I am waiting for someone to phone me…’

‘19^thMay 1977 – I am piling up dirt, dust, cigarette-tips using my hands’

‘19^thMay 1977 – I am carrying water of the river in my hands several meters down-stream…’

‘3^rdSeptember 1977 – While going down the street I bump into passer-by…’

‘8^thDecember 1977 – Covering my eyes with hands I walk blindly 9into a bunch’ of viewers standing at opposite side of the corridor. ‘

‘23^rdJanuary 1978 – I had a date with several friends… we were standing in the square talking… suddenly, I started to run… I was running over the square and got lost in one of the streets…’

Jiří Kovanda, came to De Appel in 2007. He was invited by director Ann Demeester to organize the exhibition: Jiří Kovanda Versus the Rest of The World , an ‘intervention’ and exhibition. This was conceived by the Kovanda in collaboration with the curatorial trio Work Method (Marie Cantos, Guillaume Desanges and Francois ans Piron).

Kovanda's letter to Harrie de Kroon

Kovanda's installation at the Works and Words manifestation 1979, Amsterdam.

‘23rdJanuary 1978 – I had a date with several friends… we were standing in the square talking… suddenly, I started to run… I was running over the square and got lost in one of the streets…’

‘8thDecember 1977 – Covering my eyes with hands I walk blindly into a bunch’ of viewers standing at opposite side of the corridor. ‘

‘19thMay 1977 – I am carrying water of the river in my hands several meters down-stream…’

‘3rdSeptember 1977 – While going down the street I bump into passer-by…’

‘18thNovember 1976 – I am waiting for someone to phone me…’

‘19thMay 1977 – I am piling up dirt, dust, cigarette-tips using my hands’

Something Raw 2007 - De Appel

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-Sanja Iveković and Dalibor Martinis-

Participating from Yugoslavia, Sanja Iveković and Dalibor Martinis contributed with a performance, installation and a film. The work that stood out the most was their performance:

Performance: Weather in Amsterdam. September 21^st– 30^th1979. Klein Gartmanplantsoen 14 Amsterdam. (Sanja Iveković & Dalibor Martinis)

“During our visit to Amsterdam, by situating ourselves (Sanja Iveković and Dalibor Martinis) inside/outside of the building at Klein Gartmanplantsoen 14, we performed the weather in Amsterdam (from Sept. 21-30, during local working hours). At the time of the performance little barometer-house was put on the wall of the entrance corridor of the building. “

After receiving the invitation to participate in Works and Words, Iveković and Martinis in their following letter mentioned that "the concept of the manifestation Works and Words looks open and quite similar to the ideas that we have about such meetings.” In this letter they also asked for compensation for their travel costs in case they would not be able to acquire artist grants.

However, De Appel could the grant them the travel fees as the manifestation's budget was extremely tight. (14^thJune 1979). There is a letter dated about two months later (22^ndAugust 1979), from De Appel to Ivekovic & Martinis that informs them that De Appel will manage to fund the return tickets for the couple. This suggests that De Appel really wanted the couple to participate in the exhibition, but the same accommodation options applied to them too – staying with friends of De Appel.

On the report from the research trip to Yugoslavia, De Appel team managed to meet with Iveković and Martinis. There they describe how they encountered the works of two artists. The report describes Iveković’s work as very interesting, and that she could be considered for the Feminism exhibition. At the time Sanja seemed to have worked mainly with video whilst Dalibor used other media as well.

Dalibor Martinis and Sanja Iveković, in recent e-mail correspondence with De Appel, sent a photo ensemble that showed the "duality" of their "Weather in Amsterdam" performance better. Apparently, they also did a video performance "Made in Prison" but the tape is lost.

Other works of theirs presented at the manifestation include:

Film: ‘I/JA’ Video for cable TV. Vancouver 1978, cable 10. Duration 5 minutes. (By Sanja Iveković)

Installation: Weather in Amsterdam, September 21^st– 30^th1979. Klein Gartmanplantsoen 14 Amsterdam. (Sanja Iveković & Dalibor Martinis)

Colour photograph of the 'Weather in Amsterdam' installation.

Snapshot of Sanja Iveković's 'I/JA' video.

Weather in Amsterdam, performance. Photo from Dalibor Martinis.

Poster made by Iveković and Martinis for their 'Weather in Amsterdam' performance.

Sanja Iveković and Dalibor Martinis were interviewed on the occasion of Works and Words in Artzien edited by Michael Gibbs. The interview was published in Vol.1 No.1 (October 1979) of Artzien:

Artzien's interview with the two artists

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-Dóra Maurer-

Dóra Maurer is a Hungarian artist who participated in both the photo exhibition with:

‘Tracing the Space’ III, 1978

and the film programme of the Works and Words manifestation with:

‘Relative Swings’, 1973, 10’, b/w, 35mm, opt.ds.

‘Moving Perfunctionary’, 1973, 9’, b/w , 16mm, sil.

According to the letter correspondence between Maurer and De Appel, it was quite a challenge to get in contact with her since she was constantly moving between Vienna and Budapest. Dora Maurer used her Austrian/ Hungarian double citizenship to move between the two countries, otherwise this would not have been possible.

De Appel was very determined to get her into the program. From what can be found in the archive, she was working from home for the Verschuivingen 1975-1979 exhibition that would take place between the 27^thOctober until 2^ndDecember 1979 (a few weeks after the Works and Words manifestation) at the Hedendaagse Kunst Museum (now known as Centraal Museum) in Utrecht.

In Peter Rubin’s documentation of the making of the film programme, one can see that he was taking a couple of Hungarian artists under consideration for the film programme, and mentions that he would have to make a selection by the 1^stAugust 1979. Dóra Maurer was one amongst them along with Gábor Bódi, Miklós Erdély and Tibor Hajas. In the end, all of them were included in the film programme.

On the 9^thOctober 2018 ‘Relative Swings’ will be included in the film programme put together by Sonja Simonyi in commemoration of Works and Words and the launch of the re-print of the original 1979 catalogue. http://deappel.nl/nl/events/works-and-words-revisiting-film-andas-art-from-1970s-east-central-europe-2

‘Tracing the Space’ III, 1978

Cover of Verschuivingen Exhibition booklet from the Hedendaahse Kunst Museum (Centraal Museum) in Utrecht.

Verschuivingen 1975-1979, Hedendaagse Kunst Museum

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-Tomasz Konart-

Tomasz Konart, a Polish artist, was featured in the film programme of Works and Words with his ‘Black and White Film’, 1979 (b/w, 16mm, silent) and ‘Filmlength’, 1979 (b/w, 16mm, silent). Konart was also part of the photo exhibition at the Fundatie Kunsthuis in Amsterdam, with multiple works:

'The walk', 1977

‘Photography and Memory’, number I, 1978

‘Photography and Memory’, number II, 1978

‘Photography and Breathing’, 1978

‘Black and White Photography’, 1979

‘Colour and Memory’, 1978

Tomasz Konart was very precise about the way in which he wanted his work to be understood. In the Works and Words catalogue one can see his ‘Two Points of Picture’. There he meticulously explains his concept and the way in which he perceives his art:

“I do not adhere to those basic facts and theories which are considered valid. This stems from the impossibility of precise analysis and the verification of artistic phenomena which are often incomprehensible to those who are most interested in them”

The text he has written had been edited and changed. There are many notes on the original text Konart sent as well as behind his ‘Two Points of Picture’. He has provided the viewer with descriptions of his works, possibly in order to make them more comprehensible; “to those who are most interested in them.”

De Appel's research report from the research trip to Poland included that due to technical difficulties she could not see the films but had the chance to look through Konart’s photo work. The report ends with: ‘Peter Rubin nodigt hem uit’: Peter Rubin invites him (to participate in the film program). It took a while for the invitation to arrive to Konart, due to difficulties with the consulate. In the end he managed to make it to Amsterdam in order to participate in the manifestation. Through letter correspondence between De Appel and Konart, Aggy Smeets confesses that the organization of this manifestation was very complicated.

This “Photography 1977-1979” booklet is one of 500 printed copies. The edition at De Appel archive is number 447. According to another copy from the Museum of Modern Art Warsaw (copy 419), there is the same black and white photo of a landscape stapled in the upper right corner.

Tomasz Konart also has his own website, which provides a great overview of his work.

Konart Tomasz, "Photography 1977-1979", print: Gallery P.O. Box 17, , 500 printed copies, no 447

The back side of Konart's photo in the Works and Words Catalogue.

Photo taken by T. Sikorski - Anna Wunderlich and Tomasz Konart during the Works and Words manifestation in 1979.

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-Tereza Tyszkiewicz & Zdzisław Sosnowski-

Solely from the documents in De Appel archive about Tereza Tyszkiewicz it is unclear to determine whether she was present at the Works and Words manifestation in 1979. It is even hard to locate her in the event catalogue. She has been recorded as a participant of the manifestation under the name of her husband in the glossary. Therefore her participation was not as an independent artist per se.

In the archives of De Appel, the only document that can be found of Tyszkiewicz is from a large poster made for Galeria O.N. in Poznań, ul. Fredy szsp. in 1980, which was sent by mail to De Appel in 1980. There is an interesting text of her view on feminine art on this poster. Her attendance in Works and Words is also mentioned on it.

In De Appel's research reports from their travels to Poland in preparation for the manifestation, Tyszkiewiez has only been mentioned in conversation with her husband Zdzisław Sosnowski.

De Appel seems to have been more in contact with Zdzislaw Sosnowski than with Tyszkiewicz. There is documentation of the correspondence between Zdzisław Sosnowski and De Appel concerning Works and Words where Zdzisław Sosnowski submitted a theoretical text (Photography and Film, Presence of Artist as the Object of Art) that was meant to be read in connection to their work in the photo exhibition in the Fundatie Kunsthuis in Amsterdam. This text, however, has not been included in the Works and Words catalogue.

Through recent e-mail correspondence with Zdzislaw Sosnowski, it has become apparent that he and Tyszkiewicz no longer reside in Poland but moved to Paris 30 years ago, leaving everything behind, including the Works and Words catalogue. Zdzisław Sosnowski, now, also goes by the name Ghislave Sosnowski.

From Tereza Tyszkiewiez to De Appel.

Close up of feminist text from Tereza Tyszkiewiez's poster.

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-Július Koller-

"De U.F.O. Man"

Július Koller exhibited a series of photo works at the Fundatie Kunsthuis in Amsterdam for Works and Words. He was specifically interested in communication and signals. This can be seen predominantly in his U.F.O. (Universale Futurologische Orientierung) works where he wanted to “give rise to a new subjective, consciousness, life, production” (Július Koller - One Man Anti-Show. Mumok, Vienna, 2016: 282 ). In his 1965 antihappening manifesto he states his will to challenge the status quo of the norms of the contemporary society.

De Appel used one of Koller’s U.F.O.- nautical portraits for the 1979 exhibition leaflet of the Works and Words manifestation. For Koller, playing ping-pong and tennis was a symbolic gesture. For him these sports symbolized democratic communication that functioned under a system of fair-play where the back and forth exchange of the ball between the two players signified the exchange of ideas.

In an essay written by the theoretician Tomáš Štraus titled “Three Model Situations of Contemporary Art Actions”, Július Koller has been placed under Model A: Art as a self-contained, total performance. What was particular about this model, was that artists, such as Koller, had returned to painting as a mode of art, contrary to other movements of the time such as Arte-Povera, kinetic art, pop art and so forth. Štraus was invited as an advisor for the Works and Words event since he had worked with and written a lot about art and artists from ČSFR.

Daniel Grúň, from The Július Koller Society in Bratislava, visited De Appel archive in August 2018 to research Július Koller. He stated that due to both the physical and ideological barriers between the, so-called West and East blocs of the cold war world, Július Koller had remained lesser known in the Western art world. After an exhibition featuring his work at the Kölnischer Kunstverein Univerzálne Futurologické Operácie in 2003 in Germany, his work became internationally known and witnessed an increase in academic interest. This however, was at the end of his career as he passed away a few years later, in 2007.

The Július Koller Society is a non-profit association established 2008 in Bratislava. The purpose and objectives of the association is to promote the works, artistic and cultural achievements of Július Koller as well as to enhance exchanges in contemporary arts and strengthen local and international cultural dialogue.

One of Koller’s U.F.O.- nautical portraits for the 1979 exhibition leaflet of the Works and Words manifestation

A letter by Josephine Droffelaar to Julius Koller concerning Works and Words from De Appel archive.

Július Koller, Universal. Futurologisch.Organisation (U.F.O.), 1979, felt-tip pen on paper. Courtesy The Július Koller Society, Bratislava.

Grúň, Daniel, et al. Július Koller: One Man Anti Show. Verlag der Buchhandlung Walther König, 2016.

Chronological text in the hand writing of Július Koller from De Appel archive.

Edvantyč leaflet from De Appel Archive

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-Harry Ruhé & Endré Tót-

Harry Ruhé, owner of Galerie A in Amsterdam collaborated with De Appel for the Works and Words manifestation. He was in the initial workgroup for the organization of the manifestation. At the time, Galerie A was located in the former jail “Huis van Bewaring” in the Klein Gartmanplantsoen 12, which was also the main venue of Works and Words. This jail was also used by artists; they could rent a cell out for 50 guilders a month, right on the Leidseplein.

Harry Ruhé had been in contact or had previously collaborated with artists that also participated in Works and Words, e.g. Endre Tót, Nathalia LL, Jonas Urban and more. It seems as though there was a particular familiarity between him and the Hungarian mail-and-Fluxus artist Endre Tót. He first encountered his work in the traveling Fluxshoe exhibition in 1973 of Beau Geste Press. Ruhé invited Tót to the Netherlands in 1976 for the purpose of an exhibition on Fluxus and mail art. He recalls that Tót was sleeping during the day and working at night. One day Ruhé had to make pictures of Tót wearing a shirt with his well known, “I am glad if…” motif on the back. Ruhé took about 100 pictures of Tót in different situations and locations in Amsterdam – and these photos are still part of Ruhé’s personal collection.

Ruhé also printed a collection of stamps in 1976 (as art) for Tót, and explains that when he mailed them over to Hungary, 50% of them did not cross the customs control due to a certain Hungarian policy regarding the quota of stamps in the country. From the information shared by Ruhé’s dictation of the story, the whereabouts of these stamps is unknown. Tót’s stamps are very identifiable and he has used them in many occasions when corresponding with De Appel.

On the 16^thof February, Nell Donkers and Kaspars Reinis went to visit the gallerist and Fluxus arts promoter Harry Ruhé at his home (which also serves as his gallery – Gallery A) in Amsterdam.

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-Photography Exhibition-

The photo exhibition of the Works and Words manifestation took place in the Fundatie Kunsthaus. The exhibition was open between the 15^th and 30^th of September. However, there were complications in the realization of this exhibition. De Appel unfortunately forgot to mention Fundatie Kunsthaus as a cooperative partner in the official invitation for the manifestation. As a response Fundatie Kunsthaus, who was originally responsible for the financial costs of the installation of the exhibition, as well as for sending invitations out to their and to De Appel’s guests, withdrew from this agreement in the last minute, on the 9^th of September. They questioned De Appel for considering their building as a free venue and taking advantage of their generosity. At the end they did not terminate the cooperation in consideration to the arriving artists from foreign countries who would have been also affected by this move. Instead, they requested new conditions for the cooperation: De Appel has to pay rent for the exhibition’s time, Fundatie Kunsthaus won’t cover the cost of the invitation card, they will not host an opening for the exhibition and will not arrange doorkeepers.

As a response letter on the 11^th of September De Appel apologized and promised to release a rectification as soon as possible:

“Due to a regrettable omission, the program of the manifestation Works and Words does not mention the fact that the photo exhibition is a joint project of the Stichting De Appel and the Fundatie Kunsthuis Amsterdam, where the latter not only made its building publicly available, but also is responsible for the content and installation of the exhibition.” (originally in Dutch, my translation)

It is unclear whether Fundatie Kunsthaus accepted this correction or De Appel had to accept the new conditions set up by Fundatie Kunsthaus.

Photographs of the exhibition

Several artists presented their photographs in this exhibition, many brought other works (performances or films) to the manifestation, but there were several who sent in their work only to the photo-exhibition. Many of the latter participated this way because they were not able to come to Amsterdam for the manifestation.

György Jovánovics was in Berlin during the organization of the exhibition on a DAAD (Deutscher Akademischer Austauschdienst) residency, letters to him are addressed to Berlin. The organizers had met him previously during a research trip to Budapest. They encountered his photographic works there, which led them to invite him to the manifestation. His unique, narrative photo-series were presented in the exhibition (however, presumably, not in its entirety.) Here you can see the photo-series Liza Wiathruck and a description of it translated to Dutch.

Jacek Jozwiak’s folder contains the following documentation works and photo works:

The archival material of Jiri Valoch’s participation also exhausts in these three photographs, which were part of the exhibition as a series of eight photographs.

Michal Kern from Slovakia also sent in photographs to the exhibition. At that time Michal Kern lived secluded in the High Tatras, so De Appel team did not manage to meet him. In the travel reports they describe that his photo-work’s theme is centered around nature, ecology, the understanding of space, perception and perspective. There is only one work by the artist in the archive, however this work cannot be found on the photos taken of the exhibition. A list of his photographs included in the exhibition: "Play with Cubes", "One of the Development Possibilities," "850 cm2 of the earth and the view above",The Sky Above The Moon" Clouds Motion and Speed of the Bird" Flight Determine The Direction of the Wind".

850 cm2 of the earth and the view up above

Károly Kelemen sent his photographs by mail. In a letter Kelemen also informs De Appel that he sent a text which "speaks about his relation to reality, an existential relation, how he produces his works, why he is using homogenized images and so on." This text is not in the archive however.

István Szirányi’s folder contains an envelope and a letter in which he describes the photoworks that were exhibited.

A photograph by Romuald Kutera:

Andrzej Lachowicz presented his photo-series “Concrete Photography” and “Transcription”. In the archive, there is also a theoretical text, as a cut-out from a magazine, titled "Extremital Art".

Concrete Photography

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-Film Programme-

For the film programme De Appel worked closely together with Holland Experimental Film in Amsterdam, all other parts of the event were compiled by Wies Smals, Josine van Droffelaar of De Appel, and Aggy Smeets and Piotr Olszanski, who cooperated with De Appel on this project. The film programme was at the same time part of the film event Experiment ’79 of Peter Rubin.

The films selected for the programme intended to give an overview in a form of a retrospective on the developments in film of the respective countries such as Yugoslavia and Poland. The film screenings were accompanied with lectures, seminars, discussions and a documentary exhibition at De Appel.

In De Appel Archive there are the initial lists of selected filmmakers, movies and the programme. The film programme was made possible by the close collaboration and support of Peter Rubin, who included movies from Eastern Europe at his festival Experiment '79. You can watch some of the films that were shown at Works and Words in 1979 on the Film Programme page.

( watch the selection of films from Works and Words Film Programme )

Józef Robakowski, Wojciech Bruszewski, Wies Smals and her dog Ushka or Yakutsh.

Still from Gábor Bódy's ‘The American Postcard’

Inscription on the still of Gábor Bódy's ‘The American Postcard’

Still from Tibor Hajas' 'Self Fashion Show'

Miklós Erdély presented his film ‘Dream Reconstructions’ (also called 'Dream Recollections' or 'Dream Copies') in the Works and Words Film Programme. De Appel archive holds the script of his movie in Hungarian, which was probably used for creating subtitles, as well as some signed stills of the movie dedicated to De Appel and Peter Rubin.

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-The Opening-

20th September, 1979

There is not much known on how the opening of the Works and Words events happened – there simply is not much archival material on it. The opening took place at De Appel in Brouwersgracht 196. The opening speech, on behalf of De Appel and the participants, was delivered by Loek van der Sande, who since 1974 was inspirer, confidant and advisor for Wies Smals, and until 1988 was the chairman of the board of De Appel.

Below you can read the opening speech with all the last minute additions to it, and see how the documentation exhibition of Works and Words looked like at De Appel. This exhibition was set up using the documentation that the participants and the advisors of Works and Words brought along with them or sent to De Appel, therefore providing an overview of the situation of art in Eastern Europe.

Fragment of a contact sheet - dinner at Wies Smals' home above De Appel

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-Locations-

Works and Words took place in various different locations. The films were shown at the Filmmuseum (Vondelpark 1) and in the Stedelijk Museum (Paulus Potterstraat 13). The film programme was at the same time part of the film event Experiment ' 79, organised by Peter Rubin. The photo exhibition was showcased at the Fundatie Kunsthuis Amsterdam ( Lijnbaansgracht 54). The lectures, discussions, performances and installations were held at the former jail Huis van Bewaring (Klein Gartmanplantsoen 14), mainly in the chapel. Some performances, video, as well as the documentation exhibition from the participating countries was showed at De Appel (Brouwersgracht 196), here the invited artists enjoyed a meal that was prepared every day by a group of volunteers.

Above you can see the map of the different Works and Words locations. This map was printed on an envelope and probably served for both informative and representative purposes.

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-Disclaimer-

This is the disclaimer that was probably hanging at the beginning of the documentary exhibition at De Appel in Brouwersgracht 196.

Similarly to the exhibition's claim our archival project does not pretend to be complete and has some significant gaps. We are publishing material that we have managed to piece together from correspondence, documentation and pictures of the Works and Words archive. Therefore the following material will try to illustrate the different works by Works and Words participants, by showing how the artists were approached, what practical difficulties they faced and what remains of their presence and even absence at the 1979 event in our Works and Words archive. The following posting of artists follows no particular order, such as alphabetical or by country, nor is it showcasing some artists as more important than others, it is purely coincidental, based on the material that allowed for creating the most precise impression of Works and Words.

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-Title-

Back in 1978 during the work group discussion this project was called the 'Oost-Europa' project, later it was called the 'Oost-Europa' symposium. During their research trips, filled with lengthy debates and discussions with artists and advisors from the participating countries, the work group decided to drop anything that would implicate 'East-West' division and confrontation from the title. There were a couple of working titles before the name 'Works and Words' was chosen. Such names as 'Beyond Mutual Fantasies', 'Further Acquaintance', and 'About Art and Other Things', were considered by the work group.

Below you will see the letter sent out to the work group of Works and Words with different title options and the general concept of this project, proofed by Harry Ruhé, and a response to that letter by Franck Gribling, where he favours the title 'Works and Words' above the others.

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-A Dillema-

From the very beginning of the project, Works and Words faced conceptual difficulties. The original idea of having East-West manifestation, or “OOST-EUROPA” concept, was criticized by the advisors, artists and other contact persons in the Eastern bloc. Both Josine van Droffelaar and Aggy Smeets recount these difficulties and even negative attitude towards this East-West juxtaposition in their travel-reports.

One of the advisors, Ješa Denegri, even writes his first contribution to the Works and Words project titled “So-called ‘West-East’ problem”. This text, also included in the subsequent publication, serves as a good example of how and why there was resistance towards this conceptual idea. Denegri presents arguments that in the West the art is predominantly market driven, and that there is a “smaller or greater disinterest of political power to use the art as a means of propagating their own interests. … [T]he art system prevailing in the East (the term used to designate the countries of the so-called ‘real socialism’) is ignorant to the private art market; the art institutions are in hand of the state apparatus or under its control, and the apparatus is greatly interested in promoting the views of its own ideology through art.”

A critical and well-argued letter concerning this matter of East-West division is sent to De Appel by Goran Đorđević. He says that often, when exhibited under such politico-cultural concept as the ‘East’, “the significance of such “ghetto” exhibition is, mainly, reduced to its political dimension (dissident exotic), while the nature of the works themselves, their problematic character and significance is pushed into the background.” His letter foregrounds the differences between Yugoslavia and other 'Eastern bloc' countries, and calls for critical rethinking of Works and Words.

Josine van Droffelaar in her travel report reflects on the discussions that she and Aggy Smeets had with László Beke and Lóránd Hegyi during their visit in Budapest. There were a lot of objections regarding the 'East-West confrontation'. Many questions regarding the criteria on the selection of artists, why certain artists and not others; what art De Appel was interested in - just video and performance art? Josine van Droffelaar found these discussions and criticism very healthy and helpful for the development of Works and Words.

As the concerns expressed in letter by Goran Đorđević are commenting on the conceptual problems of Works and Words, this letter is later sent to László Beke. As we can read in the travel reports, he and Lóránd Hegyi had similar concerns about the idea of ‘East-West confrontation’. They were also concerned about Josine and Aggy getting just a surface level understanding of 'East-European' art scene in general, and Hungarian art scene in particular. There are important cultural differences to take into account between Hungary, which is positioning itself as a Central European country, and Yugoslavia, which culturally, socially and politically is much different.

Below you can read a letter by László Beke, commenting on the letter by Goran Đorđević.

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-Research Trips-

Both Josine van Droffelaar and Aggy Smeets wrote a travel report for the board of De Appel. Both travel reports mention the fact that the artists were scared that this manifestation would look a lot like the Biennale of Dissent in Venice in 1977. A lot of people encountered heavy trouble and even were imprisoned because of this Biennale. The artists stated that until then they hadn’t seen a proper representation of their art in “the West”. That the artists from the different countries would be presented together was also a major concern, even if the issues in the countries varied from political to social, and economic to cultural. Josine van Droffelaar reflects on the sense of time: “Time had a major role during this trip. The people in those countries have another sense of time, another rhythm of live. (They thought I was a crazy American ‘tante’) The artists I met do have all the time in the world, for each other, for discussions, all night long, and they demanded a lot of time from me, much more than I could give them.”

Later on in her travel report Josine van Droffelaar writes on visiting the house of Tibor Hajas in Budapest. She says that she met up with very tired Aggy Smeets, who had to cope with snowstorms in Poland during her research trip there. They both met with Lóránd Hegyi and László Beke, Tibor Hajas and János Vetö.

Josine in her report describes János Vetö as a bit of a punk (something that Aggy Smeets adds today with calling him a romantic punk). He took pictures of himself in a very documentary style with different sunglasses on, so to say, possessing the different forms of his own identity. From the archive correspondence we find that János Vetö photographed both Aggy and Josine during their visit at Tibor Hajas house. Below you will see the first two pages of Josine's travel report and pictures that János Vetö took of Josine.

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-Research Group-

In De Appel Wies Smals, Josine van Droffelaar, Aggy Smeets and Piotr Olszanski were researching and organizing Works and Words. They had invited seven advisors from the participating countries in order to better understand their respective art scenes and mechanisms of contemporary developments in the last ten to fifteen years. The advisors were: Dr. Tomas Straus and Petr Štembera of Czechoslovakia, Josef Robakowksi and Zofia Kulik of Poland, László Beke of Hungary and Ješa Denegri and Marijan Susovski of Yugoslavia. The advisors also provided De Appel with documentation lists, relevant books and other publications. Most of these can still be found in De Appel Archive and are recognizable by their plastic cover.

Just like many others in the Works and Words correspondence, this letter by László Beke starts with checking if the last mail received is indeed the last mail sent.

In this letter László Beke gives some hints of literature for Josine van Droffelaar who is working on a literature list for research and documentation purposes. In the PDF you’ll find a comprehensive research that the intern Mardien Abeling collected in the Stedelijk Museum library. Book list Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam

In this letter Ješa Denegri promises to send Avanguardia e sperimentazione 1977, Galleria Civica, Modena, 1977

This letter from Petr Štembera shows that the research for Works and Words had already started in the beginning of 1978 during and after the I Am meeting in Remont gallery. Štembera performed twice during I Am and eye witness Aggy Smeets, who represented De Appel in Warsaw, was very fascinated by his performances. Štembera had been invited by Chris Burden to make a tour of performances and exhibitions in the USA and he mentions the difficulties to get permission to travel. Both Jan Mlčoch and Štembera weren’t allowed to travel to Amsterdam in 1979 and 1980.

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-Preceding Exhibitions-

I Am in 1978 was an art event that took place in Remont Gallery in Warschau, Poland. ‘International Artists Meeting-Workshops Remont ’78’ was initiated by Henryk Gajewski. There is a folder with a loose-leaf programme and catalogue in De Appel Archive. The last page of the catalogue has this picture of Henryk Gajewski.

Thanks to artists, people of art, the great audience and organizers for creating something of a unique interpersonal value at "I Am" in Galeria Remont.

On 13 april 2010 Leen Bedaux visited De Appel Archive to research I Am. De Appel Archive was located on Damrak in Amsterdam at that time. We searched the whole archive to find the archive of I Am but could only find some pictures. A month ago, deep in the Works and Words archive, we encountered several eye witness reports concerning the event in Warschau. This text by Leen Bedaux was delivered as a lecture on 24 May 2010 at Jan van Eyck Academie in Maastricht during “Agora: the archive –exhibited”

Leen Bedaux - I Am - 2010

Marga van Mechelen, the author of “de Appel Performances Installations Video Projects 1975-1983” was one of the Dutch people attending I Am in Poland in 1978. In the archive there is a handwritten witness report describing the performances on the 4^th of April in Dutch. In “L’Internationale Post-War Avant-Gardes Between 1957 and 1986 (2012, JRP Ringier, Zurich) van Mechelen published the text; Works and Words (1979) in the shadow of I Am (1987).

Works and Words (1979) in the shadow of I Am (1987)

I AM 1978 Programme

General Programme and Opening Speeches I Am, 1978

"oosteuropese conceptuele fotografie" gerrit jan de rook, 1977 On the cover of the catalogue a photowork by Sándor Pinczehelyi

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-Archive Fragment-

Following the initiative of Franck Gribling to show Eastern-European avant-garde material, a workgroup was formed and research trips to several countries were organized. After long discussions and taking many risks Works and Words took the shape of an international art manifestation featuring over a hundred artists from Yugoslavia, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Poland and the Netherlands.

People involved in the workgroup and the research were Wies Smals, Franck Gribling, Marina Abramovic, Ulay, Jan Brand, Harrie Ruhé, Karel Schampers, Josine van Droffelaar, Albert van der Weide and Aggy Smeets.

In the excerpt of the audiotape the workgroup is discussing how to conceptually resolve sensitive topics as artistic freedom and not to cause serious trouble for the participants from the Eastern Bloc.

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-Catalogue Reprint-

The catalogue is for sale at De Appel and from Roma Publications.

Photo by Roma Publications, Amsterdam.

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Curator: Nell Donkers Assisted by: Judith de Bruyn, Jacquine van Elsberg, Jan van Geem, Kaspars Reinis, Constantinos Megapanos, Mila Hamp and Amy Gowen

FOOTNOTES is a recurring exhibition format at De Appel. Its aim is to build upon, comment or deconstruct a motive from the main exhibition from within De Appel Archive or from a historical perspective.

FOOTNOTES #3 Works and Words

Werk mee aan FOOTNOTES#3. De Appel ontvangt graag uw verhaal of artefact in verband met Works and Words via nell [​at​] deappel.nl.

How to use this webpage?

Here is an ever-expanding list of the contents, you can scroll down and read the newest posts first or you can use your browser’s search tool to look for the posts that interest you the most.

TOPICS-Disclaimer--A Dilemma--Title--Research Trips--Research Group--Preceding Exhibitions--Archive Fragment--Locations--The Opening--Film Programme--Photography Exhibition--Catalogue Reprint-

-Harrie de Kroon-

See also: I am, Take the Money and Run, Mladen Stilinovic, Jiri Kovanda

-Lene Gravesen-

-Andzrej Paruzel-

Andzrej Paruzel is a multimedia artist from Poland. Paruzel’s actions were part of the documentation exhibition, for which he wrote the following statement about his artistic work:

Andzrej Paruzel also took part in the Works and Words Film Forum in the Stedelijk Museum. According to the photos taken, Film Forum was a panel discussion with Stan Brakhage, Tomislav Gotovac, Peter Rubin, Tomasz Konart, Jozef Robakowski, Gábor Bódy and Malcolm Le Grice.

-Antje von Graevenitz-

-Andzrej Kostolowski-

-Franck Gribling-

Several artists from the works and words exhibition participated in the installation of the texts, including Raoul Marroquin, Harrie de Kroon, Albert van der Weide, Reindeer Werk, Michel Cardena and Endre Tót.

-Zoran Belic-

- Sef Peeters -

Peeters had also participated in Dutch Week in 1976, an arts festival that concentrated on highlighting young artists based in the Netherlands. Later, in 1978 he exhibited an installation titled What I leave behind that intended to incite feelings of discomfort, strangeness and uncertainty.

See also: Dutch Week

-Jan Mlčoch-

Jan Mlčoch a performance artist, photographer from the Czech Republic. He did not get permission to come to Amsterdam in the fall of 1979. Documentation of many of his performance works was presented in the Works and Words exhibition. Below are a few of them with descriptions written by Mlčoch.

-Mladen Stilinovic-

Mladen Stilinovic came to Works and Words as an already prominent artist in Yugoslavia. As part of the manifestation he presented two films, a performance and a lecture. Works and Words was the first time Stilinovic had performed in front of a “western” audience.

His lecture “Speech on Language and Power” (or Discourse about Language and Power) critically addressed the hegemony of the English language. Accordingly, Stilinovic gave the lecture in Croatian, so very few, if any, of the audience could understand.

His was part of the Take the Money and Run exhibition in 2009 where thirty arts reflected upon the relationship between the economic and symbolic value of art within the auction house, alongside in the EYE Museum for the Works and Words event in 2018.

See also: Zsuzsa Laszlo article, Take the Money and Run

-Gábor Attalai-

-Michel Cardena-

See also: In-Out Center, Warming Up Etc. Etc. Etc.

-Gábor Bódy-

Gábor Bódy (1946 -1985) was a pioneer of experimental cinema in Hungary. Bódy was one of the 21 Hungarian participants in the Works and Words exhibition. It is not clear whether he came to Amsterdam for the exhibition or only his films were screened.

Gábor Bódy, to no surprise, was invited to show his films in Amsterdam. In the Film Programme, three of his films were featured:

‘Four Bagatelles’, 1975, 10’, b/w, 35mm, opt.sd.

‘Psychocosmos’, 1976, 12’, b/w, 35mm, opt.sd. 9

‘The American Postcard’, 1978, 90’, b/w, 35mm, opt.sd.

-Tomasz Sikorski-

Sikorski produced two monographs Autorecording and Tekst . Both of these monographs contain works in which the artist shows the artistic process of creation. He also visually documented many of the performances throughout the Manifestation with a series of photographs.

-Ryszard Waśko-

-Janusz Haka-

-Pawel Kwiek-

Károly Halász and Sándor Pinczehelyi

Sándor Pinczehelyi previously participated in the "Eastern-European Conceptual Photography" exhibition in Eindhoven, curated by Gerrit Jan de Rook. (See Preceding Exhibitions) Sándor Pinczehelyi’s work is on the cover of the exhibition's catalogue.

In the catalogue of one of Károly Halász’s solo-exhibition in 1988, Lóránd Hegyi writes:

Lóránd Hegyi, Hungarian art historian, who helped advising De Appel team, gave a lecture during Works and Words, and his text “The Loss of Collective Validities” is included in the catalogue.

Excerpt from Károly Halász: Transition, 1978

-Jozef Robakowski-

Robaskowski’s work had already been seen in earlier exhibitions in the Netherlands and was considered in line with the Constructivist traditions that both the Netherlands and Poland had in common so was particularly received well by Western audiences.

See also: Jozef Robakowski "Gallery Alive"

-Nan Hoover-

After the Works and Words event an article titled International Appel Manifestation: East European art puts theory first was published in de Volkskrant, a reknown Dutch newspaper, written by art critic, Marga van Mechelen.

Since 2008 the Nan Hoover Foundation takes care of the artist’s legacy.

Excerpt from the video of Nan Hoover's performance in the Stedelijk Museum, 1979. Courtesy of LIMA, Amsterdam.

-Tomislav Gotovac-

-Servie Janssen-

Janssen held a performance combined with an exhibition “Restrained will-facts and pushed forward intuition, anyway” in De Appel in 1978. Art critic, Marga van Mechelen in her book “De Appel 1975-1983” writes that Janssen’s performance was influenced by his journey to Canada.

This is the book Janssen distributed at the end of his performance Waypassenger NorthFeelLand:

In 2011 Janssen re-enacted the 9 rectangles performance with Agata Bielska in the Filmschool in Łódź in collaboration with Muzeum Sztuki.

-Natalia LL-

-Zsigmond Károlyi-

The Hungarian artist contributed with a video installation and photographs to the Works and Words exhibition. His installation consisted of two televisions placed on stands facing one another.

-Zbigniew Warpechowski-

-Reindeer Werk-

Concerning their participation in the Works and Words project the Archive contains only documentation of their performance:

Tom Puckey’s collaboration with De Appel continued even after Works and Words, the artist participated in numerous projects including the Open Avond(S) in 2017.

-Vladimir Havrilla-

Here is the artist’s description of the four films:

His photos were exhibited at the Kunsthuis Fundatie at Lijnbaansgracht 54, Amsterdam. ‘Nicodemus Question’ and ‘White prefers light’ both are series of four photos.

-KwieKulik-

Zofia Kulik and Przemysłav Kwiek formed KwieKulik, the artist duo from Poland, active between 1971 and 1987.

The artists also presented a film in the Film Program. The 12-minute long film called “Activities” is a footage of a four-day long communal act. The video can be viewed here.

Nell Donkers, De Appel's archivist visited Zofia Kulik in her home in Łódź, in 2019. Zofia showed her personal archive, which she created to document her artistic activities.

-Tibor Hajas-

During De Appel’s research trip in February of 1979 to Budapest, Hajas hosted a dinner where Hegyi and Beke were invited as well, where they discussed the upcoming exhibition.

“Yes, I know that it’s very difficult to exhibit the whole East- and Central-Europe in one gallery; but you can understand my situation as well; to show one or two works only because of the lack of place doesn’t mean more than the simple gesture of taking part in an event.”

The collaboration of De Appel and the artist did not stop with Works and Words. The artist gave a performances and exhibited photoworks in 1980 in Gent in the framework of the “6 Hongaarse kunstenaars” and other exhibitions working together with De Appel.

*This film was screened in the EYE Museum in the Works and Words: Revisiting Film as/and art form 1970s East Central Europe (2018).

-Karel Miler-

Werk mee aan FOOTNOTES#3. De Appel ontvangt graag uw verhaal of artefact in verband met Works and Words via nell [at] deappel.nl.

TOPICS

-Disclaimer-

-A Dilemma-

-Title-

-Research Trips-

-Research Group-

-Preceding Exhibitions-

-Archive Fragment-

-Locations-

-The Opening-

-Film Programme-

-Photography Exhibition-

-Catalogue Reprint-