You May Add or Subtract From the Work

Simon Leung
Art
UC Irvine

Rei Terada
Comparative Literature
UC Irvine

Inspired by an October 2016 exhibition of the artist Christopher D’Arcangelo (1954-1979) and Michael Asher (1943-2012), “Anarchism Without Adjectives,” in Los Angeles, we held a conference on the deep affinity between the work of these two artists. We addressed how the two artists formulated convergent yet different practices based on a critical analysis of the institutional power and the function of art and their subsequent effects on the material and social conditions of production, display, circulation, and reception of art. We addressed Asher and D’Archangelo’s legacy in relation to “the culture industry”; their resistance to the logic of financial speculation in art; language and power, de-hierarchization, and anarchism; and contemporary re-thinking of the limit of the law (Asher) and the police (D’Arcangelo).