Tino Sehgal at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum

By: Justin Wolf

 

Rotunda of the Guggenheim Museum. Taken during Tino Sehgal’s interactive exhibition, 2010. Photo by Justin Wolf

    The year is 1953. A young upstart named Robert Rauschenberg visits the loft studio of Willem de Kooning, by now one of New York City’s most celebrated abstractionists, and asks the artist if he may have a drawing. Naturally, de Kooning inquires as to why. Rauschenberg says he wants to erase it. Reluctant but intrigued, de Kooning hands over a work heavily marked in charcoal and lead. Nearly two months and fifteen erasers later, Erased de Kooning Drawing is completed, so to speak. “It’s not a negation,” Rauschenberg said years later, “it’s a celebration…it’s just the idea.”  

  Now it’s 2010, and conceptual artist Tino Sehgal has done to the Guggenheim Museum what Rauschenberg did to de Kooning’s drawing. All six levels of the rotunda have been cleared out, their walls rendered blank, like there was nothing there to begin with (the first time this has been done in the museum’s history!). Okay, so where’s the idea? It’s not in the erasure itself, and it’s certainly not in the tangibles - there are none. The idea of Sehgal’s exhibition resides in one’s ability to become part of a social reality, and converse within the artist’s literally twisted playground. There are no spectators here, just players.

  I walk into the Guggenheim on the afternoon of Sehgal’s opening, and the first thing I notice is the absence of a crowd getting funneled into the ticket line. Instead, the vast foyer belongs exclusively to a young couple who seduce each other, ballet-like, in fluid slow motions of kissing, turning, gazing, lusting. They are interpretive flirting, and frankly, if these two are able to avoid ravaging each other in real time at the end of a work day, I’d like to know how. The ground floor is the beginning - this is the conceptual stage.

  “Hi, I’m Ben,” says the young boy who greets me with a handshake at the entrance of Rotunda Level 1. “Would you like to learn about the exhibition?”

  “Sure,” I respond.

  “Can I ask you a question?”

  “Sure.”

  “What is progress?”

  We begin to walk together, me following Ben’s lead along the ascent, answering each question he proffers. He keeps his eyes intently focused on mine, which can’t be easy for a kid all of four feet tall. As Ben and I approach the end of the Level 1, he stops walking. A young man steps forward, introduces himself, then asks me if I believe it’s plausible to apply a “happiness index to a global population.” While considering the question, I turn around to discover that Ben has disappeared.

  The young man and I begin to walk together. The conversation evolves as we continue up the rotunda, discussing matters of personal faith, applied pragmatism, international travel and geo politics. My new companion sets the pace, he shapes the conversation, but nothing feels pre-scripted. We discover that we’re both Red Sox fans, that we’ve both visited Eastern Europe; we find common ground and shared perspectives, and our dialogue quickly becomes a real pleasure.

  By the time we reach Rotunda Level 4, an older gentleman steps forward. “You know, when I was a freshman in college, the Cuban Missile Crisis was taking place. Are you familiar with it?”

  “Yes, I am.” I turn around to discover the young man has disappeared. My brief yet evident confusion does not register with the older gentleman. He just smiles and extends his hand. The rotunda is aging, maturing, accruing the memories that define a life. I have now entered the final stretch of Sehgal’s work.

  And we begin to walk together. Our conversation centers on the human condition in the modern world, how we deal with anxiety, the parallels of facing nuclear fallout and terrorism. But our talk is patient, tempered, and I now feel more comfortable drawing on personal experiences than just personal beliefs. After he shares with me his reaction to the 1962 Crisis, I share with him my reaction – replete with context and locale – to 9/11, and how that defining moment affected both me and those around me. Keep in mind, these aren’t stories you typically share with strangers; a person’s tale of 9/11 has too much gravity to qualify as some get-to-know-you chit-chat. And this speaks to the intimacy that Tino Sehgal has shaped for his current work at the Guggenheim.

  Without these experiences, these interactions, without questions of personal responsibility and action, the spiraling ramps and accompanying walls of the museum are no more than they appear – blank. But as a practitioner of unorthodox art forms and theories, Sehgal has successfully embraced the full potential of the Guggenheim’s unorthodox aesthetic, and created something that I will ponder for months if not years to come.

Let’s face facts. The Solomon R. Guggenheim has never been the ideal venue for the visual arts. While the building is a visual wonder in itself, its naturalistic gradient too often clashes with the materiality of the works on display. Odd as it may seem, it feels like the Guggenheim has been waiting 50 years for someone like Sehgal. Some unassuming, fresh-faced artist with a strange idea to walk in and announce: I want to erase it.

 

“Tino Sehgal” at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum runs through March 10, 2010

The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum       

1071 Fifth Ave. (at 89^th St.)

Take the 4, 5, 6 trains to 86^th St.

Museum Hours: Sun-Wed 10am-5:45pm, Fri. 10am-5:45pm, Sat. 10am-7:45pm, Closed Thursdays

Exhibition website: http://www.guggenheim.org/new-york/exhibitions/on-view now/tino-sehgal

Comments

[Simmy Swinder]

I went to this show with a prominent collector. Despite a little hesitancy at first, she eventually gave into the experience. I was little put-off at first, but the show is certainly smart and the symbolism of the ascending ramp, age, and conversation levels was on point. Holland Cotter's New York Times article was very perceptive and fair but a total spoiler. Go experience it! and then go and experience it some more.

[Vincent Cimino]

I respect Sehgal's commitment to his non-materialistic ideal for art-making. Reading a feature on him in the NY Times magazine, I was wondering how he makes money, until the article described how he makes elaborate oral agreements with buyers (MoMA "loaned" The Kiss to the Guggenheim) to re-stage his works--for quite large sums of money. With all the resources we squander, even in the name of art, it is interesting to consider Sehgal's encounters as an alternative.

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