Martin Maloney
Here to stay
12 February - 13 March 2004
NICC
Jordaenskaai 13
2000 Antwerp, Belgium
opening : Thursday February 12th 6 – 9PM
Tue-Fri-Sat from 2 – 6PM
T:+32 32160771
info@nicc.be
The artists organisation NICC and the Middelheim Museum, the open air museum for modern and contemporary sculpture, are organising an exhibition on the recently deceased American artist Martin Maloney (1938 New Jersey – 2003 Antwerp). Allthough Maloney’s name is rarely mentioned in the recent history of art, this artist was present at the birth of conceptual art, maintaining contacts with Lawrence Wiener, Carl Andre, Joseph Kosuth, Dan Graham and was represented by top-galleries such as Seth Siegelaub (New York), Konrad Fisher (Dusseldorf), Art & Project (Amsterdam) and MTL (Brussels). His sustained criticism toward the artworld has forced him in the margins of art history.
The exhibition will be held in his studio. The six rooms are located in a nineteenth century building, a former meat market. In these spaces the artist integrated different works made of materials which he recovered from the space itself. He created floor-, corner- and wall pieces by using cut up wall paper, detached ceiling plaster, timbers made of doors…
Johan Pas phrases this action as follows: “Like an architectural archivist Maloney recycled and arranged the materials from the disintegrating building into geometric compositions. They would seem the material vestiges of painstaking and time-consuming drudgery, as if the restful, repetitive activity of his hands was a necessary remedy against chronic unrest of the mind.”
After the exhibition the building will be demolished, except for the monumental gate, thereby destroying both a work of art as well as cultural heritage.
Contact
NICC: Museumstraat 50 – 2000 Antwerp
T:+32 32160771 – E: info@nicc.be – W: www.nicc.be
Middelheim Museum: Middelheimlaan 61 – 2000 Antwerp
T: +32 38281350
