Six Years: The Dematerialization of the Art Object from 1966 to 1972

by Lucy R. Lippard

Book Overview

In Six Years Lucy R. Lippard documents the chaotic network of ideas that has been labeled conceptual art. The book is arranged as an annotated chronology into which is woven a rich collection of original documents--including texts by and taped discussions among and with the artists involved and by Lippard, who has also provided a new preface for this edition. The result is a book with the character of a lively contemporary forum that offers an invaluable...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0520210131
• ISBN13: 9780520210134
• Release Date: April 1997
• Publisher: University of California Press
• Length: 296 Pages
• Weight: 1.06 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.9" x 6.9" x 8.4"

Customer Reviews

As time goes by

I lived through this era and my original 1972 copy is well used and full of loose pages. If you want to find out how the tracking of turtles is art, or how Lawrence Weiner came to write phrases on walls as his art work or simply how the synergy of people working with ideas about process as an artmaking technique came to rule this is an valuable piece of first hand reporting. Looking to explain Sol Le Witt to my college students on his recent death this book gave me samples of his interactive drawings they could try.

An important contibution to modernist aesthetics.

I first read this book about twenty years ago. I am glad to see that there is a new edition. It had a major impact on my development as an artist. The author discusses the trend called "conceptual art" which flowered in the time period mentioned in the title (late 60's through early 70's). These artists rejected the craft of art and the creation of objects themselves seeking instead something more fundamental. Ms. Lippard calls this "resonance" and uses descriptions of various pieces to explore this concept. Though "conceptual art" has long since passed by, the analysis in this book is still current and applies more than ever in our "post-modernist" period.