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Dennis Oppenheim 1938 –

Annual Rings, 1968

Digestion, Gypsum Gypsies, 1989, Mixed Media

In 1967, there was a lot of attention giving alternatives to the prevailing sculptural apparatus. Some of the alternatives to these conditions that existed then, namely minimalism, found themselves retreating further and further from the object. In other words, minimalism being the continued kind of stripping down of the emotional state and the supplanting of a cold kind of objective, logical handling of form and so as this kind of rationale continued, the stripping down left or departed from the object and began looking for a kind of extra object phenomena. Now, some of this extra object phenomena was manifested in terms of conceptual, within a conceptual framework, that is the thinking process kind of detached from the physical objectification of the work. . . . So, the site-markers' function is kind of conceptual methods of claiming, in this case, existing forms that were not made by the artist so, in this case, they are similar to the Duchampian found object. (1977)

Reading Position for a Second Degree Burn 1970

Device to Root Out Evil, 1997. Harbour Green Park, Vancouver

Interview with Dennis Oppenheim by S. Boettger, July 12, 1995.

You could assume a position that, "I'm an artist and the art is inside of me, and I'm going to get it out." But I don't believe that necessarily. All you can really say is that, "I'm a certain kind of person, and it is important that I try to understand as much as I can about what kind of person I am." Almost like you're a machine -- like a . And the reason I want to understand what kind of person I am is so I can challenge the way that person functions in making art by more intellectually arrived at positions. More critically arrived at positions. I'm already assuming that the art may come from me and I may be an artist, but I'm not good enough. It's not good enough. It's never going to be good enough. There's no way that your work simply will be an outcome of your unabridged total sensibility. It has to be challenged constantly by intellect. I mean, this is paradox and gibberish in a way because the intellect comes from you. But it is almost as if you separate simply from yourself because you don't want to simply be limited by what your present acquisition is, in terms of ability. You want to keep it open that you can almost ride the way -- move away objectively, and by that you, viewing what you've done, viewing what your personality is, perceive certain things that you can change and make the art better. Once the objective is to make the art better, it's not necessarily synonymous with making yourself better. It's just making the ability -- making you capable -- yourself capable of making better work. I mean, if it's simply the divulging of who you are and what your limitations are into the art, that's limited. That does not allow for something better, something more. I think it should be an intelligent, endowed, inspired attempt to make the art more than you are. I mean, I think that's the clearest way I can say it. Certainly make the art rise. Find out how to make the art better than you are. Better meaning elevated. Become bigger than .

You have to think of the audience. I don't find that very exciting. I mean, whenever I think of the audience while I'm making the work, it fails. It seems that art does not want to figure that during its primal stages of conception. It wants to be unrestricted. Otherwise it's posture. And when it's posture, it's already nipping at the bud. You'll never know what it looks like because you intruded too soon. I've never made a piece thinking about how it will seem. I've only thought about -- I mean, if you don't want to cheat the public -- if you don't want to cheat the viewer -- the best thing the artist can do is simply concentrate on the work. That way you give them everything you can. Once you start thinking about this other stuff, it's already compromising your work. So you cheat. You give them an outdoor sculpture that you can sit on because you're worrying about them kind of relaxing. So you give them a seat, but you remove whatever little art there was in the first place. So I think if the public were really enlightened, they would simply take the artist just try as hard as they could to concentrate on the actual thing, and it will somehow, I think -- if it's really enlightened -- it will certainly take them in consideration.

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