From his legendary 2001 mulching of all his earthly possessions in an empty Oxford Street shop to the delicate drawings of weeds and pavement flowers he presented soon after, and the cast life-size replica of his childhood home he built at Tate Britain, Michael Landy's work could easily be characterised as heavily retro - retrospective, that is, in its creation of tasks that seem like a personal crusade against the erosion of time, like back-turning clock needles. His new show at Alexander and Bonin in New York shows for the first time the artist's subtextual relationship to another artist greatly concerned with the destructive powers and nature of time-based creation, Jean Tinguely.
Landy's new work, a set of highly detailed drawings made in charcoal, oilstick, glue and ink, all make reference to 'Homage to New York', Jean Tinguely's machine made in 1960 at MoMA over a period of three weeks, a work that was designed to self-destruct. On 17 March, 1960, the machine spasmed and burst into flame; despite this, it did not fully self-destruct, which involved a cast of unexpected participants, ie police and firemen, into the project. As a student Landy became aware of Tinguely's work in 1982, visiting the artist's retrospective at the Tate in London. He's been researching this project for two years at the Museum Tinguely in Basel and the Museum of Modern Art in New York, and the result is a like a blueprint of the artist's art that was to come. Some of the works are full of clarity, some are blurrier and less precise, depicting in a way the dramatic, ungraspable sense of the machine's break down.
Several 'fragments' from the 1960 Tinguely installation will be included in the exhibition, including 'the suicide carriage' from the collection of the Museum of Modern Art and the 'klaxon' from Museum Tinguely.
Michael Landy was born in 1963 in London, where he continues to lives and work. His 2001 monumental installation, Break Down was a systematic destruction of his possessions in a former department store in London. In 2004, he created Semi-detached, a full scale model of front and back facades of his parents' house, shown at Tate Britain. His work has been included in numerous group shows since 1989, including the 1997 Sensation exhibition at the Royal Academy, London and Brilliant: New Art from Britain at the Walker Art Center in 1995.
Alexander and Bonin and Thomas Dane Limited (London) are co-publishing a catalogue to accompany this exhibition. Entitled Michael Landy H2NY, the publication will feature an essay by Barry Schwabsky, images of thirty-nine of Landy's new drawings, and reproductions of press surrounding Jean Tinguely's Homage to New York, 1960, including Calvin Tomkins' comprehensive account of the life and destruction of Tinguely's Homage to New York in The New Yorker.
Lupe Nunez-Fernandez
MICHAEL LANDY, 'H2NY'
To 31 Mar 2007
Alexander and Bonin
132 Tenth Avenue
New York, NY 10011
T: +1 212 367 7474
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