SMMoA Santa Monica Museum of Art

Jeremiah Day / Simone Forti / Fred Dewey

17 May - 23 Aug 2014

Fred Dewey, Simone Forti, Jeremiah Day
Newsanimations (2012)
Performance at errant bodies in Berlin
Photo by Michael Schultze, Courtesy of the Artists
JEREMIAH DAY / SIMONE FORTI / FRED DEWEY
Nonfictions
17 May – 23 August 2014

Nonfictions, part of a decade-long intergenerational and multidisciplinary project by Jeremiah Day, Simone Forti, and Fred Dewey, explores the intersection of day-to-day life and art. The exhibition includes a new video installation—the first by the trio—along with two live collaborations and an original publication. Day, Forti, and Dewey use dance, conversation, photography, improvisation, and activist modes of performance. Through art they embody experiences and events—a combination of facts and live response—to represent the interaction of personal, civic, and public life. Integral to their installation at SMMoA, the trio presents two live performances, on May 1 and May 3, prior to the exhibition’s Opening Reception on May 17.

The Santa Monica Museum of Art is pleased to present this historic iteration of Day, Forti, and Dewey’s ongoing public investigation of artistic collaboration and improvisation. Nonfictions affirms that we are all connected—in the present and through art—to the world, to our surroundings, and to each other.

Nonfictions: Jeremiah Day/Simone Forti/Fred Dewey is organized by Elsa Longhauser, Executive Director of the Santa Monica Museum of Art.

About the Artists

Jeremiah Day earned his BA from the University of California at Los Angeles in 1997 and attended the Rijksakademie in Holland beginning in 2003. He currently lives and works in Amsterdam and Berlin. Day’s work interweaves photography, performance, and interventions in public space, with a focus on site, memory, and political history. His work has been shown at the Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam; the University of Chicago’s Smart Museum; the Centre Pompidou, Paris; and Artist’s Space, New York. Day has published several artist’s books, including Portable Memorial.

Simone Forti is an internationally acclaimed dancer, choreographer, artist, and writer based in Los Angeles. She was a seminal figure in the Judson Dance Theater community that revolutionized dance in New York in the 1960s and ’70s. Forti has performed and taught in the U.S., Canada, Europe, Asia, and South America. Her performances and artworks have been featured at prominent institutions around the world, including MoMA, New York; MOCA, Los Angeles; the Zentrum für Kunst and Medientechnologie, Karlsruhe, Germany; and the Museum der Moderne, Salzburg, Austria. Forti has collaborated with such luminaries as Robert Morris, Nam June Paik, Peter van Riper, Zev, Charlemagne Palestine, and Oguri. Her books include Handbook in Motion: an account of an ongoing personal discourse and its manifestations in dance, a poetry chapbook Angel, and Oh, Tongue, a collection of her news animations, writings, and drawings. In 2011 she received the prestigious Yoko Ono Lennon Courage Award in the Arts.

Fred Dewey is a writer, teacher, editor, and public space activist based in Los Angeles and Berlin. He directed Beyond Baroque Literary/Arts Center, in Venice, CA from 1995 to 2009, where he organized festivals, hosted and presented public programs, curated public art projects, and edited, designed, and published numerous books and anthologies. Dewey co-founded the Neighborhood Councils Movement, which helped to secure neighborhood councils in the 1999 Los Angeles City Charter. In Berlin, since 2011, Dewey has led a free, public seminar on the works of Hannah Arendt and her German and American influences. Dewey’s most recent publications include a contribution to The Lowndes County Idea, a pamphlet by Jeremiah Day; a pamphlet titled A Polis for New Conditions; and The School of Public Life (doormats/errant bodies), a new book exploring the renewal of public life through politics and culture in Los Angeles, the United States, and beyond.

This exhibition has been made possible by SMMoA’s Ambassador Circle. Support has also been provided by the City of Santa Monica and the Santa Monica Arts Commission and the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors through the Los Angeles County Arts Commission.
 

Tags: Jeremiah Day, Simone Forti, Robert Morris, Yoko Ono, Nam June Paik, Charlemagne Palestine