Wednesday, February 07, 2007

Ben Vautier

posted by Martin Crosbie @ 2:45 AM 0 comments

Nice: Ben Vautier

posted by Martin Crosbie @ 2:27 AM 0 comments

Ben Vautier


Ben Vautier (born on July 18, 1935 in Naples, Italy), also known as just Ben, is a French artist.
He's living and working in Nice, where he ran a disc shop when he was young. He discovered Yves Klein and the Nouveau Réalisme in the 1950's, but he became quickly interested in the french dada artist Marcel Duchamp, the music of John Cage and all the Fluxus artistic movement in the 1960's. He is also active in Mail-Art and is mostly know for writing his texts as a statement for example his work "L'art est inutile. Rentrez chez vous" (Art is Useless, Go Home).

He always defended the right of the minorities in any coutry, and he's been influenced by the theories of François Fontan about ethnism. For example, he has always defended the occitan language (south of France), which is about to be extinct because spokers are shifting to French.

posted by Martin Crosbie @ 2:18 AM 0 comments