Lots of money spent, but no show (Wednesday 31 October 2007)
compiled by Solenne Schmit
 |
A mobile home being hoisted into a warehouse at Mass MoCa for Christoph Büchel's Training ground; image held here |
With some exceptions, "the public never saw artist Christoph Büchel's giant installation at Mass MoCA ... the most dramatic and expensive project in the history of the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art," according to Geoff Edgers at the Boston Globe. Although a judge ruled that Mass MoCA was allowed to open the unfinished installation, the Museum's director decided to take it apart, "fearing that the fight over the remains would taint Mass MoCA's once-stellar reputation as an art-making oasis, particularly for large installations" according to Edgers, who continues:
But the fallout from this fiasco continues, even as the art world digests its lessons. Büchel has appealed the court ruling. Michele Maccarone, the New York gallery director who represents Büchel in the United States, said she will tell collectors not to support the museum and will steer her stable of artists, including Christian Jankowski and Carol Bove, away from the institution. Mass MoCA is planning a symposium this fall on the now notorious disaster.
 |
Christoph Büchel's Training ground being installed. Image held here |
Training ground, "set to open in mid-December [2006], would be a kind of American village, part ghost town, part prison camp." The curator, Nato Thompson, felt museums "had been painfully quiet when it came to the war in Iraq. Here was a chance to produce a major project inspired by the conflict. Joe Thompson saw the political ramifications, too. He would call the work the 'Guernica of our times,' referring to Picasso's mural depicting the senseless brutality of war." - Edgers. "Nato Thompson ... had been an admirer of Büchel's work ever since he saw a 2001 show at the Maccarone gallery ... [He] wrote his boss ... 'I have never programed Building 5 and I am sure I can nail this one.'"
Mass MoCA, which opened in 1999, has a relatively small budget and a relatively large amount of space. Building 5, slated for Büchel's installation, has housed shows by such well known artists as Rauschenberg and Höller. The August before Büchel was due to begin working on the installation, he presented the museum with a scale model of the finished installation. The museum apparently gave him the go-ahead on this basis and apparently also agreed to cover all related costs for the piece. But the lack of a signed agreement departed from Mass MoCA's standard procedure and angered the judge when the case came before the courts.
Büchel and the Mass MoCa team were apparently already sparring over the budget before he arrived to start the installation process. When the artist came to Mass MoCa in late October, the de-installation of a previous show was three weeks behind schedule, cutting very considerably into the seven weeks allotted for the Büchel installation. It became clear the show would have to be postponed until the spring. Büchel left as planned before Christmas, and the museum kept working.
On Büchel's return to Europe, it seems things went as follows. Büchel immediately cancelled two forthcoming exhibitions in order to give him the time to finish the installation at Mass MoCA. But then the museum called his gallery to say that the museum had run out of budget and that, unless the money could be found, the installation could not be completed. This came apparently as a complete shock to Büchel, who until this point had heard no mention of any financial difficulties. Keen to finish the installation, he decided to remain in Europe until the situation could be worked out and he could return to Mass MoCA. In the meantime, he wrote to Mass MoCA, asking that they do not let anyone see the incomplete installation, as it was a misrepresentation of his work. Unknown to him, the museum apparently already allowed art critics, politicians and members of the local press in to see the unfinished installation.
 |
Christoph Büchel's Training ground being installed. image held here |
In January 2007, the artist "wrote Joe Thompson with a strongly worded list of demands without negotiation. He would not return unless they were met ... [Joe] Thompson began to consider what he called 'Plan B,' the idea of showing the work still unfinished" - Edgers. Pushing forward without Büchel, "Joe Thompson continued working on his salvage plan, believing the public would be drawn to Training ground."
Joe Thompson "sent an official letter on museum stationery to Büchel's gallery on March 28 giving the artist two choices: Come back and finish no later than May 25, or pull out. But if you don't come, Thompson wrote, you have two more options. Pay to remove everything in the galleries, and reimburse the museum for the $300,000 to $350,000 it has spent. Or accept that the museum will either remove the material itself or open the unfinished installation to the public." - Edgers. Again according to Edgers,
The court of art-world opinion rendered its verdict long before Judge Ponsor did. Art critics from The New York Times and Globe and bloggers accused the museum of disregarding the artist's rights. Others defended the museum, with Anderson and Reynolds writing letters to the Times. ... Other art-world figures, even Mass MoCA supporters, point to clear missteps by the museum. The out-of-control budget is one issue: "I don't think that should happen," said Selma Holo, director of the International Museum Institute at the University of Southern California. "We need to be responsible to our institutions, and part of that is having a responsible budget." ...Mass MoCA's decision to sue to show the unfinished exhibit was a poor move, said Robert Storr, a former Museum of Modern Art curator who now serves as dean of the Yale School of Art. "Overall, I think MoCA behaved very well under very difficult circumstances," said Storr. "That said, if you have something that doesn't work, you back away."
 |
A finished work by Büchel - Not in MassMoCA- Simply Botiful, 2006, image held here |
For a blistering criticism of how Mass MoCA handled itself, see this article by Ken Johnson of the Boston Globe; Johnson is particularly scathing about how the museum allowed visitors see a half-veiled version of Training ground.
(Büchel is also one of the contributors to the current issue of Visual Artists Ireland's Printed Project.)
Most recent news items:
• Arts in Northern Ireland headed for major crisis? (Friday 26 October 2007)
• CAE: bullied into submission / room at the inn / Russia still po-face on art (Monday 22 October 2007)
• Beating up photographs / some unlikely geriatrics in cyberspace (Tuesday 16 October 2007)
• Conor Fallon passes / OBG Director sought / snaps (Tuesday 9 October 2007)
For a full list of news items, click here.
Latest reader
feedback:
News item 603
I have to say I agree with Circa. I have been working on a projec...
News item 624
The idea of exhibiting a group of objects bought on eBay, though ...
News item 617
It'd be interesting to see how many visitors attended the gallery...
News item 603
re. Comment 2 - most people who get turned down for grants have t...
News item 603
'sour grapes aside, what are culture ireland up to?' i think we n...
News item 606
hang on a minute... surely the feller who won the prize at art st...
News item 603
As someone who received a grant from Culture Ireland this year, f...
News item 602
try and make work that doesn't topple over in future!...
Do
you have an opinion on this article? If so, please click here for our comments form.
| Responses so far |
| Comment 1 |
Look this Circa website really makes me despair. Can no one
take control of it and make it look like it has some new
content once in a while and loose some of the really old
stuff. It seems as if it is caught in a time warp with
interviews from several months ago as recent items. And the
format? Duh! Ugly and cumbersome or what, come on 21st
century.
|
| Comment 2 |
Regarding the Circa website and the publication more
generally: The website is, as a previous comment said,
pretty unimpressive and hasn't kept up with developments in
the design of the print format, though that may be coming,
redesign can be time consuming and expensive. It is also
true that the magazine has come some way since it’s
earlier black and white incarnation.
It does seem that there is a two-tier system at work, for
articles, which appear online, and articles, which appear
in the printed publication. It would make more sense to
have more content of the magazine on the site, at a later
date than accept many articles for inclusion on the site
that the magazine does not believe worthy of print or
simply broaden the scope of the magazine itself.
More generally, many do think the magazine as pretty much an
insider publication, with so much interesting Irish art at
present a very select few artists get covered, many over
and over again. It is difficult to ascertain what the
criteria is for the inclusion of many artists time and time
again when others are given no coverage what-so-ever. It
may be argued that these artists are more influential;
making a greater impact and so forth yet on closer
inspection this seems not to be the case. This is not to
say that many of these artists should not be featured, they
should but not necessarily so repeatedly or at the
exclusion of others. This is not an issue of one artist or
another, rather representing more clearly what is happening
within visual culture both in Ireland and Irish art
internationally.
In the future it would be good to see the magazine being
broader in it's scope but with the present ethos it seems
unlikely.
It would be interesting to know what others think.
|
| Comment 3 |
I have no idea what CIRCA is but I love cheese
|
| Comment 4 |
oh now i know what it is, its an art website magazine. Why
on earth am i on an art website?
|
| Comment 5 |
Hey lay off the Circa website! This site has been very
beneficial to alot of artists and it has gained a very
interested audience globally.It has become a valuable tool
for international artists ,curators and writers to gain
access to the arts in Ireland & N.Ireland.
|
| Comment 6 |
What? Don't criticise this website to encourage it to
improve, what sort of dumb statement is that? Just get this
site updated and put more content, images, reviews etc in
and maybe more of our artists might make a living from
their art instead of depending on the dole and the useless
arts funding in the north and the boring basic workshops we
have to provide. I for one am not meeting any of these
researchers supposedly using this website. Get out to
Stormont on Monday and the various forum next month and
rant and whinge until we get this place properly working.
And just in passing IMHO the average blog spot has more
info and fun than this Circa website. Slugger blows it
away.
|
| Comment 7 |
Comment 6 got your reaction didn't I. Good come back (which
I expected by the way)
|
| Comment 8 |
I am in despair. The snobbishness and the discriminating
that goes on in the arts of Ireland. Some people have
changed their names to be more accepted, dating back as far
as William Conor. I feel that CIRCA encourages this
division. The clique of CIRCA board shows its true colours.
Can we only express ourselves with our tribalism?
|
Back
to top of page
