Yoko Ono is redefining what an exhibition space should do and how it should deal with the public
The Kunsthaus Zürich is presenting the Japanese artist Yoko Ono, one of the most important artist and performer of her generation. Thus, the show, which is curated by Yoko Ono, Jon Hendricks and Mirjam Varadinis (curator of the Kunsthaus Zürich) is focusing on her performances and actions of the 1960s and 1970s while having a generous program of real-life performance and atelier in the exhibition space.
Yoko Ono
The artist, which is born on February 18, 1933, in Tokyo is mostly known as an artist, a singer, a songwriter (mostly with John Lennon) and an activist. While the artist move to New York in 1953 with her family. She became involved into the Fluxus movement, which is a group of artists, from all around the world, which focus on the experimental and artist process of the performance.
While she became a well-known figure due to her couple with the English singer John Lennon (the Beatles), they will be one of the most importance defenders of humans rights. While they started out with their protest against the Vietnam War, the world peace and the legacy of John Lennon due to his death in December in 1980.
Herself and her conviction
Since her start of her career, Yoko Ono always as a step into the present and how it shapes new revendication. Thus, in most of her work, she focuses on the socio-political cause of today's works: feminist, homosexuality, gender, race, etc. Her work is resonating with everyone of us from the Black Lives Matter movement to same sex marriage and gender issues. But, she never formulates it radically. She prefers a poetic depiction.
With this exhibition focus on the 1960s and 1970s, in an era in which the world is rapidly changing, Yoko Ono decided to focus her practice on performance (a few of them will be "played" in the museum). Most to those performance and instruction were published by the artist in 1964, in the booklet "Grapefruit".
In this booklet, the reader and the performer are looking at simple actions that anyone can execute, and that transforms basic, everyday activities and forms of expression (such as going for a walk, striking a match or laughing) into performances.
But a performance is never enough, you need to imagine it, to change it, and to evolve it. Thus, the practice of Yoko Ono is resonating without contemporary world. From the use of audience to social and racial convictions.
Informations about the exhibition
Place: Kunsthaus Zürich
Date: 4.3.2022 – 29.5.2022
Curators: Mirjam Varadinis, Yoko Ono and Jon Hendricks
Ticket: Available on the website of the Kunsthaus Zürich OR at the front desk of the museum
Informations about the Kunsthaus Zürich
Kunsthaus Zürich
Heimplatz
CH-8001 Zürich
Phone: +41 44 253 84 84
Mail: info@kunsthaus.ch